Final

This project was supported by grant #2000-MU-MU-0014 awarded by the National Institute of Justice with funds from the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, National Institute of Justice and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control and the Administration for Children, Youth, and Families, Family and Youth Services Bureau, Family Violence Prevention and Services Act Program.

Opinions or points of view expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the funding agencies.

In 1999, the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges published Effective Intervention in Domestic Violence and Child Maltreatment Cases: Guidelines for Policy and Practice (known as The Greenbook due to its green cover). The Greenbooks principles and recommendations served as a guide for how communities and three primary systemschild welfare agencies, domestic violence service providers, and the dependency courtsshould respond to families experiencing domestic violence and child maltreatment. In 2000, six communities received funding and other support from the U.S. Department of Justice and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to implement the Greenbook recommendations over the course of a 5-year demonstration initiative.

A national evaluation examined the process and effects of implementing the Greenbook recommendations on collaboration, systems change, and practice within and across the three primary systems. This effort was led by the national evaluation team, with extensive input and assistance from the local research partners, project directors, and others at the sites and the Federal partners. The national evaluation team collected data through site visit interviews with project directors, local research partners, and key collaborative stakeholders; stakeholder surveys; direct service worker surveys for each of the three primary systems; and child welfare case file reviews. The national evaluation ended data collection activities in June 2006, but several sites continued Greenbook work using rollover funds from the original grants.

The Greenbook national evaluation results are presented in three reports. The Greenbook Demonstration Initiative: Process Evaluation Report: Phase 1 focused on the planning and goal setting phase of the Greenbook initiative in the sites. The Greenbook Demonstration Initiative: Interim Evaluation Report discussed work at the midpoint of the initiative, when the communities had moved from planning to implementation. This final evaluation report assesses the extent to which the Greenbook implementation activities facilitated cross-system and within system change and practice in the child welfare agencies, dependency courts, and domestic violence service providers. In addition to these evaluation reports, a special issue of the Journal of Interpersonal Violence will present Greenbook initiative national evaluation findings for a wide research- and policy-oriented audience (Edleson & Malik, in press).

Findings of the evaluation show the efforts the partners made, the challenges and conflicts they faced in carrying out their work, andto different degrees and in different sites and systemsthe changes they were able to bring about in how the systems work to identify and respond to the needs of families and children experiencing the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment.

The intersection of child maltreatment and domestic violence is increasingly recognized as an area where child- and family-serving organizations and the courts must work together to ensure safety for women, children, and families. Studies suggest that approximately 30 to 60 percent of families that experience one type of violence are likely to experience the other (Appel & Holden, 1998; Edleson, 1999; Hughes, Parkinson, & Vargo, 1989). Additionally, child protective services case reviews in two States indicate that domestic violence was present in more than 40 percent of cases in which a child was killed or critically injured (Schechter & Edleson, 1994; Spears, 2000). Despite the strong relationship between child maltreatment and domestic violence, the various systems that work with adult and child victims of violence often have separated or misunderstood the relatedness of these issues.

In 1999, the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges (NCJFCJ) published Effective Intervention in Domestic Violence and Child Maltreatment Cases: Guidelines for Policy and Practice (known as The Greenbook due to its green cover), which provided communities a framework for a collaborative approach to working with families experiencing the co-occurrence of child maltreatment and domestic violence. The Greenbook focused on the three primary systems that serve these families: the child welfare system, the dependency courts, and domestic violence service providers. It stated:

Child Protective Services, domestic violence agencies, juvenile courts and neighborhood residents should provide leadership to bring communities together to collaborate for the safety, well-being and stability of children and families.

Building on this collaborative foundation, The Greenbook further recommended specific policy and practice changes within and across the community agencies and organizations that serve families experiencing child maltreatment and domestic violence, particularly child welfare agencies, domestic violence service providers, and dependency courts. For example, specific Greenbook principles for guiding reforms in child welfare systems include establishing collaborative relationships with domestic violence service providers and dependency courts; taking leadership to provide services and resources to ensure family safety for those experiencing child maltreatment and adult domestic violence; developing service plans and referrals that focus on safety, stability, and well-being of all victims of family violence; and holding domestic violence perpetrators accountable (NCJFCJ, 1999).

Soon after publication of The Greenbook, the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services partnered to develop a demonstration initiative to support implementation of the Greenbook recommendations and, in 2000, awarded grants to six sites: El Paso County, Colorado; Grafton County, New Hampshire; Lane County, Oregon; San Francisco County, California; Santa Clara County, California; and St. Louis County, Missouri. These demonstration sites received Federal grants, technical assistance, and other support to implement the Greenbook principles and recommendations over a 5-year demonstration period. During that time, the sites were expected to form collaborations that would plan and implement infrastructure changes within and across several family-serving systems to better meet the needs of victims of child maltreatment and domestic violence.

A national evaluation examined the effects of implementing the Greenbook recommendations on collaboration, systems change, and practice within and across the three primary systems. This effort was led by the national evaluation team, with extensive input and assistance from the local research partners, project directors, and others at the sites and the Federal partners. The national evaluation team collected data through site visit interviews with project directors, local research partners, and key collaborative stakeholders; stakeholder surveys; direct service worker surveys for each of the three primary systems; and child welfare case file reviews.

This report presents evaluation findings and lessons learned by the participating sites, the funding agencies, and the larger field. The findings are presented in more detail in the body of the final report and in a special issue of the Journal of Interpersonal Violence (Edleson & Malik, in press).

The findings show themes that are evident across the different partner organizations, sites, and areas of implementation activities. These themes and evidence relating to them are presented here; more detailed data are presented in the findings chapters.

The sites undertook major collaborative efforts aimed at improving practices, services, and outcomes for children and families.

The Greenbook embodies a fundamental commitment to undertake collaborative efforts to change systems in order to improve practices, services, and outcomes for children and families.

In the sites, major efforts were devoted to collaboration, and the collaborations developed and changed over time. Although conflicts were experienced, sites reported that the success of their collaborations was one of the lasting accomplishments of the Greenbook initiative. Moreover, the models and protocols the Greenbook sites developed for collaboration in serving families provide valuable resources that other communities and organizations can draw from to implement change.[1]

The structure and work of the Greenbook collaborations changed over the demonstration period. Early in the initiative, the sites formed large collaborative bodies that undertook a variety of planning and collaborative development activities. Planning activities focused on analyses of needs and gaps, using logic models and other means; incorporating the perspective of domestic violence survivors and consumers of the primary systems; conducting safety audits; and carrying out system mapping to identify service gaps or duplication and needs for policies or information sharing to ensure families do not fall through the cracks.

During this initial period, sites also sought to ensure adequate representation of the different systems and developed the collaborative structure and responsibilities. Although the collaboratives employed a variety of early structures, all evolved to include an executive committee, a larger advisory board, and workgroups on specific issues. This provided mechanisms for developing and implementing plans to address particular areas of concern (workgroups or subcommittees), obtaining input from diverse partners (advisory board), and making decisions for the collaborative (executive committee).

As the Greenbook work progressed, the collaboratives identified other needed partners, in addition to the three primary systems, and added them to the collaborative. Examples of these partners include other courts (e.g., criminal courts), batterer intervention programs, law enforcement, probation and parole, and substance abuse service providers. However, community and survivor input declined over time. This might have happened for several reasons, including a lack of a clear definition of community and problems of burnout for those who took on major roles in the collaboration. Sites involved survivors in some ways. For instance, they participated in focus groups to identify issues. Survivors also were included in collaborative structures as community representatives, and one site included previously battered mothers and former batterers as family experts. Some sites noted that they should have devoted more efforts to communicating the Greenbook message beyond the collaborative partners and doing more to engage the community.

Although challenges to collaboration continued to be experienced, collaboration was identified as one of the successes of the Greenbook initiative.

The collaboratives faced a number of ongoing challenges, reflecting the difficulty of the work they engaged in together, philosophical differences among the partners, and differences in organizational structures, power, and authority.

Among the Greenbook partners, child welfare and the dependency courts represented major formal systems with well-defined roles and considerable power. The domestic violence community, by contrast, is more typically made up of grassroots organizations that do not represent a single system.

Some issues were unresolved or had to be addressed repeatedly over time. Issues of power and trust, especially between domestic violence service providers and the other systems, were ongoing challenges. Sites employed a variety of strategies to address these issues, including use of facilitated retreats and other cross-system dialogue to raise and address issues, and structural changes to balance power (e.g., adding partners to the governing body and, in one site, the creation of a domestic violence consortium).

Another recurring issue involved domestic violence service provider concerns about confidentiality. For example, practice changes to improve case-level collaboration (e.g., multidisciplinary case reviews and hiring domestic violence advocates in the child welfare system) often included the child welfare agencys expectation that domestic violence service providers would share information about individual cases. This conflicted with the domestic violence service philosophy of facilitating a safe environment for victims by ensuring confidentiality. To address this issue, sites implemented cross-trainings on confidentiality and related concerns.

By working collaboratively to implement the Greenbook guidelines and solve problems, the partner organizations addressed issues of power, trust, and responsibilities. The partners developed a better understanding of the context and environment that shape how the other systems operate. They learned more about each others agencies, the challenges they face, and developed relationships at multiple levels within the organizations to implement new ways to work together to serve families. The sites spent a great deal of time on collaboration, and see the relationships they developed, particularly the relationship between child welfare and domestic violence service providers, as one of the successes of the Greenbook. Changes in the relationships were described by partners as night and day and light years ahead of what they used to be.

Through the Greenbook initiative, there were changes in practice at the level of work with families and children. The different partner organizations contributed to this change in different ways.

The Greenbook initiative involved communities and child- and family-serving organizations taking the Greenbook guidelines and putting them into practice in their real day-to-day world for agencies, organizations, families and communities. To bring about change, organizations needed to undertake major changes in activities, operations, and ways of thinking. The literature on the implementation of evidence-based practices provides a framework for undertaking and evaluating change. Successful implementation requires a number of factors, including assessment of need and readiness for change, support of key stakeholders, training and other support for changed practice, and ongoing feedback and adaptation (Fixsen, Naoom, Blasé, Friedman, & Wallace, 2005; Metz, 2007; Metz, Blasé, & Bowie, 2007). The Greenbook demonstration initiative is one of a number of system change initiatives undertaken by the U.S. Department of Justice and other Federal agencies. (For results of the evaluation of the Safe Start initiative for children exposed to violence, see the winter 2008 issue of Best Practices in Mental Health.)

Partners contributed in different ways to the collaborations. Judges took a lead role, serving as chairs or members of steering committees, and lending their authority and influence within each community to help the collaborative do its work. Domestic violence service providers were actively involved in the collaborative leadership and working groups. They served particularly as agents for change, ensuring the concerns of domestic violence victims were articulated and their needs addressed. Child welfare undertook substantial change in agency practice. Stakeholders noted that the participation of child welfare agency leaders and their willingness to forge relationships with organizations with which they historically have had troublesome relationships was a facilitator to the Greenbook process.

Child welfare agencies were the focus of the majority of systems change activities. Early practice-related activities focused on improving identification of co-occurrence through means such as revised intake and screening protocols and staff training. The focus on this area reflected both the perceived gaps in identification of domestic violence in child welfare cases and the fact that this was a relatively well-defined, concrete area for action.

Child welfare undertook additional training for caseworkers on domestic violence, co-occurrence, and the impact of domestic violence on children. Child welfare agencies also expanded their use of co-located advocates, multidisciplinary case review, and other arrangements for sharing resources and expertise to address cases involving domestic violence. For example, one site developed a child protection team protocol. All child maltreatment cases presenting with domestic violence were reviewed by a multidisciplinary case planning team that included a domestic violence advocate, and caseworkers were trained on the use of the child protection protocol. Also in this site, guidelines were developed to protect the confidentiality of adult domestic violence victims, and policy was changed so dependency and neglect petitions minimized the use of blaming language related to the non-offending parent.

The effects of changed child welfare practice were seen in several areas. Over the course of the initiative, there was an increase in the proportion of child welfare case files that showed evidence of active screening for domestic violence (i.e., domestic violence was indicated by the victim during an interview or on a form as a part of the child welfare case file). The other main area in which change in practice was evident was in referrals to services, which showed increased referrals to treatment services for victims of domestic violence.

Overall, the increase in child welfare case screening for domestic violence was greater in the earlier period (from 2001 to 2003) than in the later period (from 2003 to 2005) and one site that had an initial increase showed a decrease in the later period. Several factors appear to have contributed to this decrease in screening for domestic violence. Although all the sites implemented new or revised tools to assess for domestic violence at case intake, the tools were not always used routinely. Agencies need to provide frequent training and reinforcement to ensure a practice is implemented until it is routine for all workers, but this was not always done; the problem of sustaining practice was made more difficult by the high turnover among child welfare caseworkers.

There has been concern in the domestic violence community that increasing identification of co-occurrence, if not linked to change in child welfare practice, may have the negative effect of re-victimization of women who are victims of domestic violence. Evidence from this study does not suggest this happened, however. For example, in interviews with stakeholders from the domestic violence community in the sites, this was not identified as a problem experienced in the Greenbook initiative. If anything it appears that more positive practice (e.g., increased referrals for service) occurred as a result of the efforts to better identify domestic violence among child welfare cases.

In child welfare, direct service workers, as well as leaders and other stakeholders perceived some change in practice over time. For example, there was an increase over time in the proportion of both stakeholders and child welfare direct service workers who agreed with the statement that child welfare works closely with domestic violence service providers to address co-occurrence. In some other areas, there was little perception of changed practice, either because respondents already perceived practice favorably or, in some cases, possibly because the focus on assessing practice raised awareness of ways practice could be improved.

The practice change in child welfare was facilitated by several characteristics of the participating agencies, including collaborative involvement of key decision-makers who had the authority to implement change, having a hierarchical organizational structure, prior experience with system change efforts, and practices such as pre-service and in-service training that could support change.

Domestic violence service providers also participated in change. Although these organizations were the focus of fewer system change activities than child welfare, they participated in many cross-system activities, such as training and multidisciplinary case review, and provided co-located domestic violence victim advocates to the other systems. Their engagement in the collaborative leadership and working groups also helped ensure that the concerns and needs of domestic violence victims were heard by the collaborative.

In one site, the main domestic violence service provider in the county made a major change in practice by adding child maltreatment screening items to its intake protocol, including an entire section of child behavioral indicators. Changes also included moving questions about the child to the front of the intake protocol, and replacing language on the protocol that was deemed to be judgmental with language that reflected behavioral descriptors. The Greenbook project director was housed at the domestic violence service agency, which probably contributed to the implementation of change in this site.

In general, it appears that the experience of training and working together fostered increased understanding and capacity for collaboration between child welfare agencies and domestic violence service providers at the direct service level. For example, the creation of specialized positions, particularly domestic violence advocates co-located in child welfare agency offices, helped bridge the gap between systems so they could address volatile issues such as information sharing across systems and the use of failure to protect in situations of domestic violence.

Over the course of the Greenbook initiative, more stakeholders reported that domestic violence service providers offered training for staff to understand, recognize, and respond to child maltreatment, shared information with child welfare agencies, and worked with child welfare agencies in investigations, risk assessments, service planning, and safety planning, although direct service workers in domestic violence did not perceive change during this period.

Overall, the findings for domestic violence service providers point to emerging changes in how they address child maltreatment and collaboration with child welfare agencies that serve families experiencing co-occurrence. Meanwhile, they continue to maintain their established practices and their commitment to empowerment and protection for victims of domestic violence.

The courts also were participants in change. Judges played leadership roles in the collaborative and served as spokespersons for the Greenbook initiative in State, municipal, and community settings. Although this was valuable, in several sites it also was associated with increased perception of power differentials between the courts and other Greenbook collaborators.

All the Greenbook sites implemented some form of training for judges and other court personnel. Most of the training was intended to improve understanding of domestic violence and its impact on child protection cases. Judges in several sites reported that cross-training activities with other systems helped them understand how domestic violence service providers and child welfare agencies operate, and that these trainings were helpful and needed.

A number of judges reported that they adopted new practices and took steps to ensure the safety of adult and child victims of domestic violence both within and outside their courtrooms. In one site that had a history of collaboration related to co-occurrence, both stakeholders and direct service workers in the different systems reported that the courts actively collaborated and shared information on cases with child welfare personnel and domestic violence service providers.

Overall, however, there was relatively little change in practice among the courts in the Greenbook sites. Additionally, collaboration among courts to address problems of families with co-occurrence did not become a major focus of efforts in the Greenbook demonstration sites, and the data do not show change in collaboration among different courts in the sites.

The organizational structure of the dependency court and the role of judges appear to have been barriers to change. Judges were bound by law and legal precedent, and there was no hierarchical structure or mandatory training to incorporate systemic changes into the courts. As a result, although court staff were responsive to training opportunities, and some courts implemented practice changes, there was limited overall change.

The extent and patterns of change varied among sites and systems and was affected by the larger context of practice.

Change was challenging to achieve and sustain. The Greenbook sites varied in the extent to which they implemented change because of differences in community context, history of collaboration, leadership, and resources. For several sites, a history of collaboration to address child and family issues was an important facilitator, as was the existence of practices (e.g., use of a domestic violence advocate) that could be built upon for this initiative. For example, one site already had a number of collaborative efforts in place at the beginning of the demonstration period, including a domestic violence council, child abuse council, violence prevention council, and multidisciplinary child abuse team. This site was able to capitalize on existing resources to sustain practices already in place, and to focus on policies that were not being transformed into practice effectively. In some other sites, positions were created but not sustained over time because of lack of funding, change in conditions that reduced the need for the position, or problems in implementing and using the position, among other factors. Experimentation with new processes, not all of which worked or were continued, was part of the Greenbook initiative.

In one area, the Greenbook sites addressed an issue that had taken on increasing prominence since the original development of the Greenbook. This was holding batterers accountable for the perpetration of violence and protecting women and children against exposure to further violence. Batterer accountability was addressed both in child welfare agencies and in the courts. Examples of child welfare activities included training workers on patterns of coercive control, accountability, and working with men who batter; the use of a fathering-after-violence consultant to help staff work with batterers; and collaboration with probation and parole to learn about batterers parole conditions. In several sites, child welfare case file data showed an increase in referrals to services for batterers.

The courts also were engaged in activities related to batterer accountability. One site hired a domestic violence case monitor to track compliance with batterer treatment requirements, and another implemented a criminal court violence compliance docket. In another site, domestic violence victim advocates met with judges to discuss ways to improve safety within courtrooms, and judges made changes to improve safety and prevent batterer intimidation of victims. Also in this site, the criminal court used a database to track batters. The increased emphasis on batterer accountability in the Greenbook sites provides an example of how the Greenbook initiative, with its focus on collaboration and system change, helped sites take on emerging issues in co-occurrence.

Among the three primary partner systems, change in practice was most evident in child welfare. However, not all changes were sustained fully over time. For example, data for several sites indicate an initial increase in active screening for domestic violence that was not sustained over the longer period. The child welfare system is characterized by high turnover, especially among case workers, and is subject to demands to improve services and outcomes for children and families, underlining the need for strong, sustained effort to maintain practice change over time.

For child welfare, moreover, addressing the needs of families with co-occurrence is only one of many demands on the system. Major drivers of child welfare agencies policies and actions are the need to meet Federal standards and the requirements imposed by consent decrees or settlement agreements in response to class action lawsuits brought against State or local child welfare agencies.

With the Childrens Bureaus implementation of the Child and Family Services Review (CFSR) process, which started in 2000, States participate in the assessment of services and outcomes for children and families, based on case record reviews, interviews with children and families, and interviews with community stakeholders. Based on the review outcomes, States develop and implement program improvement plans. The CFSR process focuses on child safety, permanency, and well-being for the broad population of children served, rather than on the needs of specific groups, such as children in families with co-occurrence. Additionally, in a number of States, consent decrees resulting from class action suits specify operations or services that State or local child welfare agencies must offer in such areas as foster care placement, child protective services, provision of mental health or other services, and staffing or other caseworker issues. Together, CFSRs and consent decrees are major determinants of the focus of services and practice change in child welfare.

Bringing about change requires time, effort, and other resources. Furthermore, the process of change often is uneven and requires revisiting issues and needs repeatedly over time. Limited staff, funding, and other resources are a challenge to collaborative efforts, especially if there are large differences among partners resources.

Technical assistance from external consultants was a valuable resource for supporting change through the Greenbook initiative. One of the key roles of technical assistance was to help break down barriers and facilitate communication among partners. In addition, the Greenbook sites provided valuable peer-to-peer support to each other.

Shared focus and working together on problems that could not be solved without the efforts of multiple organizations was important for motivating and achieving change.

Because child protection and domestic violence are addressed by different organizations, child welfare, domestic violence service providers, and the courts had to work together to achieve Greenbook goals. Staff at all levels of the organizations worked together to carry out the Greenbook workin the governance board and working groups, in cross-trainings, and in work on individual cases (through the work of domestic violence victim advocates and multidisciplinary case reviews).

This multi-level collaboration forced partner organizations and staff at all levels to address issues of trust, organizational philosophy, differential resources, and problem solving for families. Not all issues were resolved in all cases; challenges related to power, trust, information sharing, and associated issues continued to be faced. By working together, however, the partner organizations in the sites made progress on these issues.

Different partners, structures, and activities needed to be involved at different times, both in the larger cross-system collaborative and within systems.

Achieving system change required work at multiple levels of the organizations and sustained work over time. Early in the initiative, the sites took time to conduct needs assessments, relationship building, and other preliminary activities, and saw this effort as important to successful implementation of the initiative. Practice changes focused initially on improved identification of co-occurrence within the child welfare system and on training for workers.

Over time, the structure and membership of the collaboratives changed. The structures evolved to include a decision-making body, a larger advisory group, and workgroups that focused on developing and implementing plans in specific areas. The sites added other partners, such as law enforcement or batterer intervention programs, as the initiatives needs and focus developed.

In other instances, changes were less positive. Over time, community and survivor input declined, and several sites noted that they should have devoted more efforts to communicating with and engaging the community. Similarly, lack of collaboration between dependency courts and other courts was identified as a gap in the Greenbook work.

Sites varied in the degree and timing of worker involvement. They noted that implementing new policies at the frontline practice level was a challenge because of the gap between leadership and direct service workers, staff workload, high staff turnover and other factors. Once policy or practice was changed administratively, agencies needed to provide training and support for implementation. Several noted that engaging frontline workers earlier could have helped this process.

With the support of the U.S. Department of Justice and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, communities around the country that participated in the Greenbook initiative took on the challenge of working across and within major child- and family-serving systems to better meet the needs of child and adult victims of domestic violence and child maltreatment. The sites experience shows the efforts the partners made, the challenges and conflicts they faced in carrying out their work, andto different degrees and in different sites and systemsthe changes they were able to bring about in how the systems work to identify and respond to the needs of families and children. Although collaboration was often difficult and important issues recurred or were not fully resolved, the partners persisted in working together, developed a deeper understanding of each others work, and saw the collaboration as one of the accomplishments of their work. Through their work together, the partners undertook changes in practices for serving families. Once practice changes were made, continuing effort was needed to ensure implementation and maintain practice over time; in the case of identification, for example, early gains were not fully sustained. The challenges and accomplishments of the sites and partners demonstrate the importance of investing and persisting in collaborative efforts to identify problems and craft solutions for serving children and families in need. Changed perspectives and relationships, as well as changed practices, are important accomplishments of these efforts, and provide lessons for other communities.

The intersection of child maltreatment and domestic violence is undeniable and is increasingly recognized as an area where child- and family-serving organizations and the courts must work together to ensure safety for those affected. Studies suggest that approximately 30 percent to 60 percent of families that experience one type of violence are likely to experience the other (Appel & Holden, 1998; Edleson, 1999; Hughes, Parkinson, & Vargo, 1989; Stark & Filcraft, 1988). Additionally, child protective services case reviews in two States indicate that domestic violence was present in more than 40 percent of cases in which a child was killed or critically injured (Felix & McCarthy, 1994; Schecter & Edleson, 1994; Spears, 2000). The approach to working with families experiencing the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment traditionally has focused on a single victim or issue and has involved service systems working in isolation from one another. Despite the strong relationship between child maltreatment and domestic violence, the various systems that work with adult and child victims of violence have often separated or misunderstood the interrelatedness of these issues. No single system, however, is equipped for meeting all the needs of victims of co-occurrence, nor should it be held responsible for doing so (Whitney & Davis, 1999).

Significant social problems cannot be resolved by any one agency, but they require the collaboration of multiple agencies. When problems arise, single agencies can only address the symptom itself, but when efforts are coordinated, then the underlying problem can be addressed (Gomez & de los Santos, 1993). In the past decade, multi-agency collaborations have increasingly been viewed as the most effective way to deliver the best services and be responsive to the needs of those using the services (Miller & Ahmad, 2000). Collaborations are essential to delivering coordinated services from multiple agencies to those in need. Multi-system collaborative efforts offer a number of potential benefits to improve the experiences of families involved with child welfare agencies, domestic violence service providers, dependency courts, and other family-serving systems.

There has been a movement toward increased collaboration among the primary systems (child welfare agencies, domestic violence service providers, and the dependency courts) that serve and advocate for these victims of violence. A collaborative approach that responds to the entire familyrather than an isolated victimcan enhance family safety and well-being. Collaboration across differing systems can confront a number of obstacles, including building trust among these traditionally competing systems, ensuring victim safety and respect, and understanding the inherent complexities of enacting systems change. Recognizing both the benefits of and obstacles to forming collaborations, the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges (NCJFCJ) published Effective Intervention in Domestic Violence and Child Maltreatment Cases: Guidelines for Policy and Practice (1998), which provides a collaborative roadmap for child welfare systems, dependency courts, and domestic violence service providers. This publication, commonly known as The Greenbook due to its green cover, examines the principles of promoting safety and well-being for all victims of family violence, holding batterers accountable, and structuring responses to families dealing with the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment.

Since 2001, six communities nationwide have implemented the systems change efforts outlined in The Greenbook.[2] The national technical assistance team and the Federal partners from the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) supported the six sites, and the national evaluation team documented site activities. All sites advanced from the planning phase to full implementation and are concluding their 5-year demonstration grants.

Domestic violence and child maltreatment are compelling issues that greatly affect our society. Each year, approximately one million children are maltreated and two million women are abused (Edleson, 1999). Research has suggested that the presence of one type of family violence increases the likelihood of the other (Browne & Hamilton, 1999). Many studies have found that there is significant overlap between child maltreatment and domestic violence in the same households, but estimating the level of co-occurrence is difficult (Edleson, 1999). Additionally, the definition of co-occurrence varies from study to study. For example, one review of the research defined co-occurrence as the proportion of families experiencing either child maltreatment or adult domestic violence, where there is evidence that the other form of violence is also being perpetrated within that same household (Edleson, 1999). Other research has defined co-occurrence as the proportion of families that are involved in the child protection system and that also experience domestic violence (Findlater & Kelly, 1999). Definitions of co-occurrence also may differ by whether the two forms of violence occur during the same time period or if they occurred at any time in the family's history. While estimating the actual level of co-occurrence is difficult, the phenomenon nevertheless is present and a growing concern in communities across the country.

Organizations serving maltreated children and those serving battered women are recognizing increasingly the overlap of child maltreatment and domestic violence. However, delivery of services for maltreated children and domestic violence victims continues to be fragmented for various reasons, including the fact that the organizations are at different points in their development, operate under different philosophies and mandates, and use different professional terminology (Bragg, 2003).

Despite these differences, collaborative efforts among child protective service agencies, domestic violence service providers, and dependency courts are emerging based on a common goal of achieving safety from violence for all family members (Findlater & Kelly, 1999). To effectively respond through collaboration, relevant organizations must have a shared framework and a balanced approach to identify and address the impact that violence has on the family as a whole (Spears, 2000). Successful collaboration will not evolve instantaneously, but a shared vision for all systems involved will foster progress. Supportive leadership, trust across systems, recognition and understanding of common goals, and a willingness to change policy and practice can make significant contributions to successful collaboration.

The Greenbook initiative recognizes and builds on earlier collaborative work to address the co-occurrence of child maltreatment and domestic violence. Cross-system collaborations from Massachusetts, Michigan, and San Diego are described below.

The Massachusetts Department of Social Services (DSS) Domestic Violence Unit was the nation's first system-wide effort within a child protection agency to bring domestic violence expertise to child protection decision-making (NCJFCJ, 1998). In 1987, DSS began joint planning with advocates for battered women. After an infant was murdered by the mothers abuser in 1989, DSS initiated Project Protect, which revised intake and case practice guidelines to enhance response to domestic violence. The program emphasized the need to serve multiple victims within the same family. In 1990, the first domestic violence advocate was hired at DSS, and in 1993, a separate domestic violence unit was created. A domestic violence protocol for DSS workers was developed 2 years later (Whitney & Davis, 1999). When the domestic violence unit was established, it was structured on the belief that the best interest of children in families experiencing domestic violence cannot be separated from the best interest of their mothers. This program has increased the ability of DSS staff to recognize domestic violence in the cases they handle, reduce unnecessary out-of-home placement of children, and increase cooperation between advocates for battered women and child protection workers (NCJFCJ, 1998).

In 1985, the Michigan DSS began a home-based initiative to help families resolve problems before they became severe enough to have their children removed from the home. The project is now known as Michigan Families First: Domestic Violence Collaboration Project (Families First) and is a core service in the child welfare continuum in 83 Michigan counties. This project has an intensive 4- to 6-week, in-home crisis intervention program. Families First is the result of the State leadership's commitment to providing coordinated services to families enduring child abuse and domestic violence. The goal of Families First is to enable families to stay together safely by identifying and building on each familys strengths and offering services that are tailored to the familys needs and goals.

In 1993, Families First began a dialogue with the Governor's Domestic Violence Prevention and Treatment Board (DVPTB) and soon requested a domestic violence in-service training seminar for family preservation workers. Families First and DVPTB worked together to develop extensive cross training, and in 1995, Michigan became the first State to institutionalize mandatory training for all family preservation workers and supervisors (NCCAN, 2003). This cooperation led to family preservation teams being placed in battered womens shelters.

In 1994, San Diego piloted the Family Violence Project to improve protection for victims of family violence by enhancing and coordinating case management activities between the Childrens Services Bureau and the Probation Department. The Family Violence Project unit, composed of staff from both departments, manages and supervises cases of families who are involved in both systems because of domestic violence. The Family Violence Project integrates both child protection and adult probation services to minimize re-victimization and maximize safety.

Additionally, the Chadwick Center for Children and Families at San Diego Childrens Hospital has developed a family violence program that works with mothers and children to provide supportive counseling and cross-court advocacy for up to 2 years. The program's advocates are often the ones to communicate to one court about the proceedings of another (Edleson, 1999).

In the late 1990s, growing attention to the co-occurrence of child maltreatment and domestic violence led to many initiatives to change policy and practice (Edleson, 2001). While relevant organizations may have recognized the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment in the families they served, there had not been a coordinated effort in identifying and addressing the needs of these families. As a result, NCJFCJ organized experts in the fields of domestic violence and child maltreatment to discuss more effective responses to families experiencing co-occurrence.

In 1999, the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges published Effective Intervention in Domestic Violence and Child Maltreatment Cases: Guidelines for Policy and Practice (also known as The Greenbook due to its green cover), which provided a framework for a collaborative approach to working with families who are experiencing the co-occurrence of child maltreatment and domestic violence. The Greenbooks principles and recommendations served as a guide for how communities and the three primary systems that serve such familieschild welfare agencies, domestic violence service providers, and the dependency courtsidentify and respond to those experiencing co-occurrence issues.

During the development of this publication NCJFCJ formed an advisory committee that included a diverse group of professionals from the court, social services, law enforcement, domestic violence organizations, and the academic community to review 200 programs across the country. The committee selected 35 programs to be visited by committee members to collect data so they could describe the programs accurately. NCJFCJ published Family Violence: Emerging Programs for Battered Mothers and their Children, which was the first attempt to summarize information about programs that addressed this issue, so other communities could replicate the programs.

Following release of this publication, NCJFCJ convened another advisory committee of professionals from the courts, child welfare agencies, domestic violence service providers, Federal agencies, and the academic community to write The Greenbook, which provided a framework for communities to improve their response to families experiencing both domestic violence and child maltreatment. The publication examined the principles of safety and well-being for all victims of family violence, including holding batterers accountable and structuring responses to families dealing with co-occurrence. The Greenbook focused on the three primary systems that traditionally have served victims of child maltreatment and domestic violence: the child protective system, domestic violence service providers, and the dependency courts, which have jurisdiction over child maltreatment cases. The guidance in The Greenbook supported a collaborative response to families experiencing the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment. The Greenbook recognized the mandates of each primary system and recommended ways to improve responses both within the three primary systems and, through collaborative efforts, across systems.

In 2000, Federal agencies initiated a demonstration project to implement the Greenbook guidelines. The Departments of Justice (DOJ) and Health and Human Services (HHS) reviewed proposals from more than 90 communities and conducted site visits to examine community strengths, limitations, and flexibility, and to assess the proposed project's vision, the communitys determination, and the availability of resources to carry out the efforts. Based on findings from those site visits and the desire for a diverse group of communities, DOJ and HHS selected the following six demonstration sites: El Paso County, Colorado; Grafton County, New Hampshire; Lane County, Oregon; St. Louis County, Missouri; San Francisco County, California; and Santa Clara County, California. These six communities received Federal funding and other support to implement The Greenbooks recommendations over the course of a 5-year demonstration initiative.

El Paso and Lane counties are characterized by open spaces and national parks punctuated by urban centers where the large majority of the population lives. Both counties have a majority White population, with a growing Hispanic community. St. Louis and Santa Clara counties each have large populations that are spread throughout the counties. Although they are still a small proportion of the population in St. Louis County, the Asian and Pacific Islander populations are growing faster than any other ethnic group. As the population of Santa Clara County has grown, it also has become more diverse. As of 2000, less than one-half of the population was White, while roughly one-fourth self-identified as Hispanic, and one-fourth were of Asian or Pacific Islander descent. Grafton County is a large, rural county comprising roughly 20 percent of New Hampshires land, but has a relatively small population of 82,000. Its residents are overwhelmingly White; just three percent identify as persons of color. San Francisco County, on the other hand, is the smallest county in California in terms of square miles, but it has a large population that is among the most diverse in the world. In 2000, the population of San Francisco County was composed of Whites (44 percent), Asians (31 percent), Hispanics (14 percent), African-Americans (8 percent), and other races (3 percent).

All six Greenbook initiative sites involved a collaboration of agencies from the three primary systems, and the key members in each site included the heads of the agencies from the three primary systems, a project director, and local research partners. The collaborations also included other key organizations, which varied from site to site, such as survivors, law enforcement, mental health service providers, and other existing collaborations. The sites were a diverse group of communities in terms of population, culture, and geography. While populations in some of the sites were racially homogeneous, others were ethnically and culturally diverse. The sites also had various experience addressing the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment. Despite these differences, each site demonstrated the need and dedication to improve how co-occurrence was addressed in its community.[3]

The Greenbook initiative also included the national technical assistance team and a national evaluation team, as well as Federal partners from DOJ and HHS. DOJ partners were the Office for Violence Against Women, the Office for Victims of Crime, the National Institute of Justice, and the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. HHS partners were the Childrens Bureau and the Office of Community Services in the Administration for Children and Families, the Division of Violence Prevention in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation. Each site was assigned a Federal monitor to assist with planning, implementation, and administrative issues.

All sites had access to the technical assistance team, which was led by the NCJFCJ Family Violence Department and included the Family Violence Prevention Fund and the American Public Human Services Association. The technical assistance team provided peer support, individual consultation, and help with needs assessments and strategic planning for each of the sites.

The national evaluation team, which was led by Caliber Associates (now ICF International) and included the Education Development Center and the National Center for State Courts, documented the progress of the six demonstration sites. The evaluation examined the effects of implementing the Greenbook recommendations on collaboration and systems change. The national evaluation team developed a research design to study cross-site and within-system change in the six sites. Each site had a national evaluation team site liaison who worked with the sites project director and locally hired researcher (local research partner) to collect and analyze data.

Through a series of three reports, the Greenbook national evaluation has documented the progress of the six demonstration communities. The Greenbook Demonstration Initiative: Process Evaluation Report: Phase 1 focused on the first phase of the Greenbook initiative in each of the sites: planning and goal setting. Specifically, the report examined start-up activities during the first year of the initiative, such as developing collaborative governance structures and guidance policies, building capacity and trust, conducting system and community needs assessments, planning for the enhancement and/or expansion of services, changing programs and policies, and building data system infrastructures. The Greenbook Demonstration Initiative: Interim Evaluation Report focused on progress at the midpoint of the initiative, when the communities had moved from planning to implementation. This final evaluation report assesses the extent to which the implementation activities facilitated systems change related to policy and practice in the demonstration sites. This report describes the results of the national evaluation of the demonstration grants, including Greenbook recommendations, activities planned and implemented, outcome evaluation findings, and lessons learned.

The evaluation activities are critical to understanding the outcome of the systems change efforts in the demonstration communities and the strategies and processes communities used to achieve those outcomes. The evaluation not only has documented systems change in the demonstration communities by assessing the impact of following the Greenbook recommendations on systems policy and practice, but also provides a blueprint for other communities interested in following the Greenbook recommendations.

This report describes site activities and progress over the course of the Greenbook initiative. The national evaluation ended data collection activities in June 2006, but several sites continued Greenbook work using rollover funds from the original grants. Previous reports (Caliber Associates, Education Development Center, & The National Center for State Courts, 2004a; Caliber Associates, Educational Development Center, & The National Center for State Courts, 2004b) analyzed process and outcome data during the planning phase and the mid-point of the implementation phase This report assesses the extent to which Greenbook implementation activities facilitated system changes related to policy and practices in child welfare agencies, dependency courts, and domestic violence service providers at each demonstration site.[4]

This report documents the progress of the demonstration sites over the course of the Greenbook initiative. The next chapter provides an overview of the national evaluation, while subsequent chapters describe evaluation results and implementation activities organized by the following key areas:

Collaboration. This chapter focuses on the operation of collaborative networks at each demonstration site and uses data from the stakeholder survey. For further context, qualitative information about site experiences and activities, which was gathered through interviews with key stakeholders, is presented with these data.

Screening and assessment. This chapter presents data collected from child welfare case files and direct service worker surveys to depict each demonstration sites screening and assessment policies and procedures over the course of the Greenbook initiative.

Safety and advocacy for child and adult victims. This chapter presents data collected from direct service worker surveys, case file reviews, and stakeholder surveys to describe the extent to which primary systems involved with the project improved their response to child and adult victims of violence. For further context, qualitative information about site experiences and activities, gathered through interviews with site collaborative members, is presented with these data.

Batterer accountability. This chapter presents data collected from direct service worker surveys and case file reviews. These data are used to describe the extent to which primary systems involved with the Greenbook initiative at each demonstration site implemented activities to ensure that batterers are held accountable for violence.

Many activities may have affected more than one of these areas and, therefore, are discussed in multiple chapters. Each chapter provides information on Greenbook recommendations related to each of these areas, evaluation data collected during the initiative, and the qualitative experiences of those involved in the initiative.

The goal of the national evaluation was to develop and implement a strategy for gaining a formative understanding of sites planning and implementation processes and a summative assessment of the impact of such work on communities, systems, and families. The national evaluation included an outcome component and a process component to describe not only what systems changes took place in the demonstration sites, but how those changes occurred. The outcome evaluation component assessed systems changes related to how systems collaborate, identify co-occurrence, share information, and respond to co-occurrence. The process evaluation documented how those identified system changes occurred by describing how sites prioritized implementation activities, how collaborative networks were formed and operated, and what challenges and facilitators sites encountered while following the Greenbook recommendations. The process evaluation also assessed the impact of being part of a national demonstration initiative, including the demonstration sites use of Federal guidance, technical assistance, and local and national evaluation resources.

The Greenbook provided a framework for implementing systems change to improve the safety and well-being of families experiencing co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment. It included 67 recommendations that offered guidance for creating a collaborative framework and for implementing change both across and within systems. The Greenbook recommended specific changes within child welfare agencies, domestic violence service providers, and dependency courts for identifying and responding to families experiencing co-occurrence.

The Greenbook initiative evaluation used a multilevel, multisite comparative research design to study cross-system and within-system changes. The evaluation explored the impact of implementing Greenbook activities on systems change across multiple levels, from agency heads to direct service workers. This approach allowed the national evaluation team to analyze the extent to which policy changes and inter-organizational collaboration changed direct service worker practices, and to make inferences about the likelihood of those changes altering the way direct service workers work with clients. Although collaboration and changes in the three primary systems could have a profound effect on women and children, directly linking systems changes to family changes, such as safety and well-being, was beyond the scope of this evaluation.

The process evaluation explored how systems collaborated to address problems of domestic violence and child maltreatment, what strategies or activities they undertook as they addressed the multifaceted needs of domestic violence victims and children, and why initiatives were successful or unsuccessful in achieving desired goals. Variation in the sites also led to questions regarding what local factors predict collaboration, especially given the diversity of the sites history of collaboration. The outcome evaluation examined the effect these strategies had on how systems identify and address co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment.

Interviews were conducted with project directors, local research partners, and key collaborative stakeholders to identify the activities that the sites implemented or planned to implement through their local Greenbook projects; understand the structure, membership, experiences, dynamics, and activities of the Greenbook collaborative bodies; and understand how stakeholders perceived the challenges and successes related to the implementation and collaborative activities. Key stakeholder interviews were conducted with at least one collaborative member from each of the three primary systems at each site, as well as any other stakeholders deemed appropriate on a site-by-site basis. For example, in sites that identified a fourth collaborative partner, a stakeholder from that agency was interviewed.

The stakeholder survey (see Appendix A) was developed to capture information about project planning, activity implementation, the status of the collaboration at each site, the communitys capacity for planning and implementing the project, and the facilitators and obstacles encountered by the sites. The national evaluation team distributed the stakeholder surveys to key members of the Greenbook planning and implementation teams, including members of the collaborative boards, steering committees, and workgroups. The stakeholder survey was administered near the end of the demonstration planning period (2002, baseline) there were a total of 90 respondents across the sites, and follow-up stakeholder survey data were collected 2 years later (2004, follow-up), there were a total of 71 respondents across sites[5]

The direct service worker survey (see Appendix A) was administered to frontline workers from each of the three primary systems to assess the extent to which new policies, changes in organizational practice, and inter-organizational collaboration affected system policy and practice. Slightly different surveys were administered to direct service workers in each of the three systems, but all versions included questions related to co-occurrence training, agency policies and practices related to the identification of co-occurrence, and agency responses to those cases. The baseline direct service worker survey was conducted after the end of the demonstration planning period (2003) with a total of 275 respondents across sites, and follow-up data were collected 2 years later (2005) with a total of 224[6].

Child welfare case files were reviewed to gather data (see Appendix A) on the extent to which domestic violence co-occurs with child maltreatment, screening and assessment practices used by the child welfare system to identify domestic violence, steps taken to protect confidentiality when sharing information with other systems, and referrals to services for families with identified co-occurring issues. A random sample of substantiated cases of child maltreatment was reviewed in each site at the beginning of the demonstration initiative (2001) with a total of 616 case files reviewed across sites, after the end of the planning period (2003) with a total of 642 case files reviewed across sites, and toward the end of the implementation period (2005) with a total of 562 case files reviewed across sites.

Significant social problems cannot be resolved by any one agency, but they require the collaboration of multiple agencies. When problems arise, single agencies can only address the symptom itself, but when efforts are coordinated, then the underlying problem can be addressed (Gomez & de los Santos, 1993). In the past decade, multi-agency collaborations have increasingly been viewed as the most effective way to deliver the best services and be responsive to the needs of those using the services (Miller & Ahmad, 2000).

While collaborative approaches are promising, they can be difficult to achieve for a number of reasons. Collaborative work requires change across multiple agencies and across multiple levels within agencies. This change must be coordinated and planned with commitment from key agency leaders and collaborative partners. A collaboration must negotiate philosophical differences among stakeholders from different systems who bring different goals, principles, and values to the table (OConnor, 2007).

Despite these challenges, collaborations are essential to delivering coordinated services from multiple agencies to those in need. Multi-system collaborative efforts offer a number of potential benefits to improve the experiences of families involved with child welfare agencies, domestic violence service providers, dependency courts, and other family-serving systems. Recognizing the benefits as well as the obstacles to a collaborative approach, the Greenbook demonstration initiative provided Federal funding to six communities to implement Greenbook recommendations and organize collaborations to plan and implement systems change in partner agencies during the demonstration period. Detailed descriptions of the collaborative structure established by each demonstration site during the planning phase can be found in The Greenbook Demonstration Initiative: Process Evaluation Report: Phase I and The Greenbook Demonstration Initiative: Interim Evaluation Report.

The demonstration sites established and organized collaborative groups in accordance with the Greenbook foundational principles and recommendations, including representation from multiple levels within the primary partner systems (child welfare, domestic violence service providers and dependency courts) and other organizations, as well as the community. The sites struggled with how to engage consumers of the primary systems, however, and devoted a great deal of time to understanding and addressing organizational differences between the partners. Other salient collaborative influences included leadership, resources, trust, and commitment. The stakeholders noted that the collaborative relationships required a great deal of work, but were ultimately one of the main successes of the initiative. Other successes included the policy and practice changes planned within the partner agencies themselves.

This chapter describes the partners that participated in Greenbook collaboratives; the governance structure of Greenbook collaboratives; how Greenbook collaboratives developed, planned, and implemented activities; and the impact of implementation activities on the systems and communities involved.

Greenbook Recommendations

The following recommendations from The Greenbook are particularly relevant to collaborative dynamics.

Recommendation 5. Every community should have a mechanism to bring together administrators and staff from a variety of agencies, as well as representative community members and service consumers; to close the gaps in services; to coordinate multiple interventions; and to develop interagency agreements and protocols for providing basic services to families experiencing both child maltreatment and domestic violence.

Recommendation 7. Communities around the country should study and adapt efforts that integrate child welfare, domestic violence, and juvenile court responses.

Recommendation 29. Domestic violence programs, child protective services, child welfare agencies, and juvenile courts should collaborate to develop joint protocols to remove interagency policy and practice barriers for battered women and their families and to enhance family safety and well-being.

Recommendation 42. Batterer intervention programs, working collaboratively with law enforcement, courts, child protection agencies, and domestic violence agencies, should take a leadership role to improve the coordination and monitoring of legal and social service interventions for perpetrators in order to enhance safety, stability, and well-being for adult and child victims.

Recommendation 54. Judges should collaborate with State and local child protective service administrators and domestic violence service program directors to determine what resources must be made available in the community to meet the needs of victims and perpetrators of domestic violence.

A combination of qualitative and quantitative analyses were conducted to describe collaborative activities and perceived impact. Collaborative planning and implementation activities are described through qualitative analyses from interviews with and documents provided by collaborative partners in the six demonstration sites. Qualitative data were collected during on-site interviews with stakeholders and key project staff responsible for guiding and implementing the work. Project staff also provided documents of collaborative processes and activities. Qualitative analyses provided a profile of the collaborations and what activities they planned and implemented. Qualitative analyses were augmented by quantitative data to describe stakeholders perceptions of the planning process in their communities. Quantitative data were collected from partners (stakeholders) surveyed at different points in the initiative to examine the impact of collaborative activities on the collaboration itself, the partner systems, and the community.

Project directors at each of the sites also worked with the national evaluation team to develop implementation activity grids. These grids catalogued all collaborative activities that were wholly or partially supported by the Federal demonstration funds, including local activities or projects influenced by Greenbook work. These cumulative grids were updated with project directors during each of the site visits, and reflected the efforts of the collaboration over the course of the demonstration initiative. The implementation activities were coded by the target of the activity (a specific system, the community as a whole, or the partners) and whether the activity was directed primarily at planning or system change. Planning activities were those designed to develop and maintain the collaboration, and systems change activities were those supported by the collaboration to effect policy and/or practice change in one or more of the Greenbook partner systems. Additionally, implementation activities were coded by activity type, with the types allowed to emerge through qualitative analysis of the implementation activity grids across sites. Results were reported by number and type of activities implemented.

Collaborative processes also were examined through quantitative analyses of stakeholder survey data. Nonparametric tests were performed on stakeholder survey data to determine the extent to which changes identified from baseline to follow-up were significant. Where response scales were the same across survey administrations, significance tests were performed using the t statistic. For some measures, however, baseline stakeholder survey data were collected on a different scale than the follow-up survey data.[7] In these cases, the Kruskal-Wallis Test, a one-way analysis of variance by ranks, was used to examine whether there were significant changes over time associated with mean scores for the stakeholder survey data. To accommodate the differences between these scales, baseline and follow-up stakeholder survey data were transformed to create a more equivalent scale across both time points. First, the value of one was subtracted from each point on both stakeholder survey scales so that the minimum value for both scales was zero. Next, for baseline data, the scale of 0 (strongly disagree) to 3 (strongly agree) was transformed by multiplying each point on the scale by four. For follow-up data, the scale of 0 (strongly disagree) to 4 (strongly agree) was transformed by multiplying each point by three. This created a common scale of 0 (strongly disagree) to 12 (strongly agree) with a median of 6. All analyses using these variables were conducted using a 0 to 12 scale.

Quantitative and qualitative data collected from collaborative stakeholders were examined to determine whether the collaborations followed The Greenbooks foundational principles and recommendations. This section will describe the makeup of the collaborations, to include the partners and governance structure and then discuss the implementation activities and outcomes encountered during the course of the collaborative work.

The number of collaborative members varied widely across the sites and across the time periods of the initiative. Over the course of the initiative, the average number of collaborative members per site was approximately 60.

As expected, most of the collaborative members came from one of the three primary systems (child welfare, dependency courts and domestic violence service providers) and other community leaders and representatives. Across time, approximately one fifth of the membership represented domestic violence service providers; one fifth represented the child welfare system and between one fifth and one third represented the court system. Court membership on the collaboration increased over time, likely due to the addition of the criminal court stakeholders along with the already participating dependency court stakeholders.

There was a wide array of child welfare agency partners involved, ranging from directors to managers and frontline workers. Many stakeholders cited the participation of child welfare agency leaders, including their willingness to be self-reflective and forge relationships with agencies they historically have been at odds with, as a collaborative facilitator. Domestic violence service providers most often were represented on the collaborations by their directors and advocates. The biggest struggle for domestic violence service provider partners had been that they did not represent an identifiable system like the other two primary partners. Some sites had one domestic violence service provider agency in the community, while others had 26. Providing equal and continuous representation from this system had been an ongoing obstacle. The dependency courts most often were represented on the collaboration by judges and, in most sites, the judicial partner was the most consistent member of the collaboration. Judges were often seen as leaders of the initiative due to their traditionally powerful role in the courtroom and the community.

Other key systems and groups included mental health, survivors, and former clients, law enforcement, cultural and ethnic groups, and batterer intervention programs. Some sites included other systems as primary partners, such as a collaborative emergency response team (the Domestic Violence Emergency Response Team in El Paso County), law enforcement (Santa Clara County), Court Appointed Special Advocates (in El Paso and Grafton counties), probation and parole (Lane County), batterer intervention providers (San Francisco County), and a community-based child advocacy agency (Lane County). In San Francisco County, stakeholders considered the community as their initiatives fourth partner. Nearly all the sites included these and other systems (e.g., culturally specific agencies, child advocacy centers, district attorneys offices, substance abuse treatment providers) in their work, even if they were not primary partner agencies.

While involvement from batterer intervention providers increased somewhat over time, involvement from survivors and former clients decreased. Involving victims was a struggle on different levels for each community. This was also associated with having limited resources to support these community members, as well as working with the comfort level of working with stakeholders from the primary systems. Some sites attempted to include the survivor perspective through formal collaborative process, with survivors serving as co-chairs of governing or advisory committees or workgroups. Over time, however, the role of these survivors led to burnout for not only the community members but other stakeholders and the decision to involve survivors in a more informal and specialized roles. There were also sites that viewed the community as its forth partner in this initiative. It is important to note that the term community, however was never defined and there was no formal process for ensuring the community perspective was acknowledged. Stakeholders noted that there was way too little survivor voice on the project, but also noted that they did not think that there was a clear understanding of what the voice of a survivor should be.

While collaborative structures were established during the planning phase, each of the demonstration sites fine-tuned those structures during the early implementation phase. Four of the six sites established three-tier governing structures during the planning phase; by the end of the implementation phase, all six sites were using this organizational structure. The three-tier structure featured:

Executive committee. Functioned as the decision-making body and governing structure of the local Greenbook initiative. Members met on a regular basis and included project leaders, such as the project director and heads of the three primary systems, and other primary partner agencies.

Advisory board. Provided a forum for discussing Greenbook-related activities and issues and advised the executive committee on the direction of the initiative. Members met regularly and included representatives from the three primary partner agencies, as well as other agencies that served child and adult victims of family violence.

Workgroups or subcommittees. Provided system- or task-specific expertise to inform collaborative or implementation activities. Members met as needed to complete assigned tasks as directed by the executive committee and advisory board.

The executive committee was composed of representatives from each of the primary systems, as well as any other formal partners at each site. The executive committees typically were charged with making fiscal and administrative decisions, leading the development of policies, and hiring and supervising paid Greenbook staff (e.g., project directors, local research partners, support staff). The demonstration sites found that having a smaller group of key stakeholders charged with decision-making was more efficient than involving a large group of people in the process. The second tier brainstormed and developed ideas, shared system-specific information, and made recommendations to the primary governing body for final decisions. Representatives from the second tier also tended to staff the workgroups or subcommittees. The workgroups generally were supervised by and reported to their executive committee. Sites typically created workgroups that were organized either by system (e.g., a court or child protective services subcommittee charged with single-system assessment and activities) or by cross-system task (e.g., a cross-training workgroup). Often, workgroups became more efficient because they were able to focus on very specific issues.

Sites also sought to include the perspectives of community members, whose lives were most directly affected by these systems, in the development of policy and its translation to direct practice. Each site approached the role of the community somewhat differently. All sites included individual and/or focus group interviews with battered mothers and battering father figures in their local evaluations. The El Paso County site included in its collaboration family experts or community members (e.g., previously battered mothers, former batterers) who had been involved with one of the three primary systems. While survivor perspectives were represented to varying degrees within the collaborations, the demonstration sites had a difficult time integrating these survivors into the larger collaborative structure. Judicial ethics, which specified maintaining impartiality in ongoing cases, for example, had been one problematic issue. The majority of demonstration sites did not include survivors as survivors per se in their collaborative structures (i.e., the individuals role was as a general community member and not specifically as a survivor of violence) and, as a result, avoided ethical challenges to judicial impartiality when there might have been the appearance of ex parte communication (i.e., communication about a court case without all parties being present) through Greenbook initiative activities.

Greenbook sites began by identifying an organization to house the grant, recruiting key members, hiring staff, and developing an organizational structure. Once these startup activities were underway, the demonstration sites starting planning and executing the Greenbook work. This section describes the planning and systems change activities developed and supported by the Greenbook collaborations during the grant period, and the impact of those activities on the collaboration and the primary partner systems. The data in this section come from the implementation activity grids which catalogue the activities of each site. The percentages presented are based on the 203 separate implementation activities described in the grid.

Collaborative implementation activities included planning activities and systems change activities. Across demonstration sites, a little less than half of all implementation activities were planning activities (43%), and the remaining activities were directed at systems change in one or more of the partner systems (57%) (see Figure III-1).

Planning activities were implemented by the demonstration sites to build and maintain the collaboration itself and to plan and prioritize systems change work. Planning activities were categorized further into collaborative building activities (12% of all implementation activities); community needs or gaps analyses (12%); communicating the message beyond Greenbook partners (7%); other planning activities, including sustainability (6%); and building and maintaining relationships and communication among Greenbook partners (6%) (see Figure III-2).

Although sites engaged in a number of activities necessary to build their collaboration and lay the foundation for the work, stakeholder responses to questions posed during site visits indicated that needs assessments, relationship building, and engaging the community were critical to effectively planning the work. Needs assessments and gaps analyses, including the voice of survivors of family violence and consumers of the primary systems, were key to identifying existing gaps and setting goals for the initiative. Collaborations perhaps underestimated the resources required to build productive relationships, as stakeholders reported that many challenges, such as those related to power, trust, and leadership issues, had to be reassessed continually throughout the initiative. Stakeholders reported that they should have spent more time and attention from the beginning on communicating the message beyond collaborative partners and effectively engaging the community in the work.

Needs/gaps analyses. Needs/gaps analyses were among the top four types of activities implemented by the sites, encompassing 12 percent of all implementation activities. These analyses helped sites determine their priorities and included reviewing Greenbook recommendations, developing a logic model, incorporating the voice from survivors of family violence and consumers of the primary systems, and conducting safety audits. Stakeholders reported that local research partners were invaluable to the planning, process, and utility of the needs assessment activities. Results of assessment activities across sites were used to define project goals and expected outcomes and to provide a roadmap for the collaborative work.

All sites developed a logic model during the first 18 months of the initiative, using the logic models to link identified needs with objectives and expected outcomes at the end of the grant period. Generally, these needs, objectives, and outcomes were linked through identified resources and specific planning activities. Local research partners played an important role in each site, helping to communicate the usefulness of logic models and develop them in concert with local initiative stakeholders. During on-site interviews, Greenbook stakeholders talked about the value of logic model development activities. In general, these activities helped facilitate a common understanding of the problem of co-occurrence among local collaborative members. Logic models were used less as sites shifted from planning to system change activities; some stakeholders felt they still were connected to these logic models, but others felt that the work was more organic over time, flowing from the particular interests of active collaborative members at the time.

Another important needs analysis activity was system mapping to determine where there might be duplication or lack of services, as well as the need for information sharing between systems or an additional policy or practice to ensure families did not fall through the cracks. These activities included an assessment of information sharing needs among the courts and an annual review of existing agency protocols. Many sites also conducted a safety audit with the help of the technical assistance providers and consultants. The safety audit was a formal process to examine the policy and practice of a specific system and how it worked with families experiencing domestic violence and child maltreatment. The sites that conducted the safety audit benefited from the process but, in retrospect, would have implemented this activity much sooner in the demonstration initiative.

Establishing and maintaining collaborative relationships. The demonstration sites allocated about 6 percent of their efforts to establishing, maintaining, and strengthening relationships and communication among partners. This type of activity was less of a focus compared to other types in the demonstration sites, although most stakeholders reported that maintaining collaborative relationships was the most important part of the work and required the most attention.

Power issues were ongoing obstacles in all the demonstration sites, most often between domestic violence service providers and other primary partners, as the child welfare and court systems had more organizational resources and community authority associated with bureaucracy, financial resources, and other sources of power. Stakeholders noted that power often was concentrated in the court system, which was frustrating to many since this system seemed to be the focus of the fewest system change activities compared to other partner systems. Domestic violence service providers were generally at the other end of the power spectrum due to their limited resources. The demonstration sites took steps to balance power among partners however, such as adding more partners to the governing body to balance adult and victim perspectives. Other strategies included retreats facilitated by technical assistance staff to address power, better integration between governing and advisory bodies to ensure all voices were heard, and the creation of a domestic violence consortium to unify domestic violence service providers. An imbalance of power often led to trust issues at the sites, which were addressed through cross-system dialogue, in addition to neutral facilitation and leadership, to create a safe environment for discussing important issues.

Philosophical or fundamental differences in systems approaches prompted hot button issues to emerge, such as information sharing across systems, mandated services for domestic violence victims, child witness to domestic violence, batterer engagement, cultural competency, and the use of failure to protect in situations of domestic violence. The creation of specialized positions, particularly domestic violence advocates co-located in child welfare agency offices, helped to bridge the gap between various systems and address information sharing and other volatile issues. Other implementation activities designed to address such issues included cross-discipline discussions.

The challenges described by stakeholders during site visit interviews also were highlighted in stakeholder survey results. Surveyed stakeholders were asked the extent to which they agreed that certain obstacles were encountered in their community. Stakeholders were significantly more likely to agree at follow-up compared to baseline that a lack of resources, conflicting organizational cultures, lack of accountability, and too great an emphasis on collaboration as opposed to individuals served were obstacles (see Appendix B). These changes likely were driven by the nature of collaborative work and the focus on cross-training, developing institutional empathy, discussion of emerging issues, and the move from planning to implementation, all of which were key activities at the survey follow-up point. Despite these significant changes, stakeholders on average did not agree that any of the survey measures were obstacles, as nearly all measures received an average rating of 2.5 or less on a scale of 1 to 5.

Stakeholders interviewed during site visits reported that effective leadership and neutral facilitation were helpful in addressing these obstacles, however. Characteristics of effective leaders included the ability to see issues from different points of view and a broad vision to understand how system change could evolve community-wide. Respect and credibility in the community were also important, as well as the ability to mobilize others. Sites also found that having outside, neutral facilitators during collaborative meetings and retreats helped to balance power, establish trust, and support open communication.

Many stakeholders reported that the development of relationships among the primary partner systems was a key success of the initiative, particularly the relationship between child welfare and domestic violence service providers. The collaboration resulted in better relationships and better understanding at all levels. Changes in the relationships were described as night and day, improved by leaps and bounds, and light years ahead of what they used to be.

Communicating the Greenbook message beyond the partners. Communicating the Greenbook message beyond the partners accounted for 7 percent of all implementation activities. These activities were important to ensure community buy-in and support for the Greenbook work, and helped support sustainability efforts later. The work of partners in the community outside the collaboration helped spark discussion about challenging issues and shape priorities for the initiative. Many sites joined other collaborations already underway to maximize existing resources without duplicating efforts. The demonstration sites also sponsored conferences, speakers, or training opportunities on Greenbook issues for the community and agencies and organizations outside the official Greenbook partnership.

Survey results showed that stakeholders did not significantly change their perceptions of the planning process on most measures (see Appendix C). At follow-up, stakeholders were significantly more likely to agree that the abilities of collaborative members were used effectively. They were significantly less likely to agree that the roles and responsibilities of collaborative members were clear, however. At both time points, stakeholders generally agreed that the planning process had a feeling of cohesiveness, was flexible enough to accept diversity in members views and backgrounds, and had strong commitment from the policy-makers of each organization represented. Stakeholders at both survey administrations also agreed that those working on the initiative had many competing responsibilities.

Systems Change Activities

The outputs of the collaborative building efforts and planning activities are the systems change activities implemented in one or more Greenbook partner systems. Sites spent more than half of their efforts (57%) on implementation activities that were directed toward systems change (see Figure III-3). These were largely training and other checklists or informal guideline change activities, but also included multidisciplinary case review and response, specialized positions, and screening and assessment protocols.

Many sites initiated the systems change work with screening and assessment protocols, most often policy or practice changes to child welfare agency efforts to screen for domestic violence. Training was the most prevalent type of system change activity in the demonstration sites, encompassing 19 percent of all implementation activities. Training generally focused on understanding the dynamics of co-occurrence for diverse staff in the partner agencies, including judges and frontline workers, and occurred at both the collaborative and practice levels. According to stakeholder interviews, however, the most influential systems change activities focused on specialized positions and multidisciplinary case review and response, as these activities directly engaged workers at multiple levels and across systems in collaborative efforts.

Multidisciplinary case review and response. Although sites were less engaged in multidisciplinary review and response activities compared to other types of systems change efforts, these activities were instrumental in engaging multiple systems with a family at critical points. Multidisciplinary case response activities involved multiple systems responding to and serving cases of identified co-occurrence. For example, Santa Clara County developed a resource for multidisciplinary response to domestic violence cases, which included guidance on providing assistance to victims and best practices for cases involving children (immediate response, urgent review, or routine review). The protocol was used by first responders (law enforcement) and involved child welfare staff and domestic violence victim advocates as appropriate. Santa Clara County also supported the Family Violence Review Team, which included police detectives, police investigators, victim witness office staff, child protective services, domestic violence victim advocates, and probation officers. The team reviewed one or two police reports of the most severe domestic violence filed each week and made home visits or calls to the victims to provide additional supports. Where indicated, the team conducted safety planning with adult and child victims and worked to ensure perpetrator compliance. Multidisciplinary response teams also were formed in Lane County for situations that involved a child witness to domestic violence, and included domestic violence service providers, child protective services, the district attorneys office, and community service providers. The approach featured a safe environment for child forensic interviewing with all the relevant parties present to minimize the possibility of children having to recount their experiences multiple times. Other members of the team provided support and resources simultaneously for adult victims.

Specialized positions. Most sites created or redefined specialized positions early in the demonstration period and continued to support, expand, or modify these positions over the course of the initiative. Specialized positions included domestic violence victim advocates co-located in child welfare offices, court staff responsible for holding batterers accountable, and systems analysts who regularly reviewed potential gaps and improvements in the way the systems responded to families. Half of all specialized positions were located in the child welfare system, and one-third were found in the justice system. Specialized positions were created or enhanced by the Greenbook initiative to facilitate cross-system information sharing, institutional empathy, or more appropriate handling of cases involving child maltreatment and domestic violence. Stakeholders interviewed at the sites reported that specialized positions were particularly effective at engaging frontline workers in the collaboration, forming a bridge and supporting institutional empathy across systems, and providing the resources to respond to family violence in a more collaborative and comprehensive manner.

The findings described above detail the activities of the Greenbook demonstration sites over the course of the grant period. These implementation activities included those to develop and maintain the collaborative process, plan the Greenbook work, and implement system change activities in one or more of the Greenbook partner systems. The purpose of all these activities, however, was to change the way child welfare agencies, domestic violence service providers, dependency courts, and other family-serving systems worked with families experiencing child maltreatment and domestic violence. As such, the collaborations measure their success not only in the collaborative processes they developed, but also in the system change that occurred in the partner agencies.

More system change activities focused on child welfare agencies compared to the other two primary systems. A little more than a quarter of system change activities were implemented across systems, and 22 percent were implemented in the justice system. The domestic violence service provider system was the focus of the fewest system change activities, although this system participated in many of the cross-system activities, such as training and multidisciplinary case review and response, and largely shaped or supported activities targeting other systems, such as co-located advocates in the child welfare system (see Figure III-4).

The sites generally started systems change activities with the child welfare system, which contained a number of facilitators for system change. These facilitators included the hierarchical structure, collaborative involvement of key decision-makers who had the power to implement system-wide changes, experience with system change efforts, and existing practices that were amenable to system change, such as mandatory training for new workers and ongoing training for existing staff. Stakeholders also noted that the child welfare systems willingness to be reflective by opening up case files for review and being the first system to implement Greenbook system change efforts was a model for other systems.

Based on their experience with the child welfare system, many stakeholders reported that they had unrealistic expectations for systems change in the other two primary partners. For example, the organizational structure of the dependency court was not as amenable to system change as the child welfare systems structure. Judges were bound by law and legal precedent, and there was no hierarchical structure or mandatory training to infuse systemic changes across courtrooms. As a result, in most sites court staff were responsive to training opportunities, and some isolated changes in policy and practice occurred. Some court stakeholders implemented change in their own courts or influenced change in others, but many questioned how much the Greenbook issues were reinforced by judicial collaborative members, who may have been restricted by the organization of the system itself.

Although The Greenbook recommended a number of policy and practice changes for dependency courts, the demonstration sites focused their system change activities on a number of partners in the judicial system. This expanded focus occurred because sites recognized the obstacles inherent in implementing system change in the dependency court, and also because families experiencing co-occurrence were involved with a number of courts and other justice system agencies (e.g., the district attorneys office, law enforcement, probation, and parole) in addition to the dependency court. The justice system was the focus of 22 percent of system change activities, most likely to be training, specialized positions, or other checklist/guideline changes.

Domestic violence service providers did not constitute a defined system, but instead were a group of organizations that conducted similar work. Sometimes these agencies came together in a coalition, but they still were a group that was difficult to represent adequately by the involvement of one or two collaborative members. Also, these agencies were not bound by the same bureaucracy that guided the child welfare system. Furthermore, domestic violence service providers generally lacked the financial or staff resources to be active in a number of collaborative activities or to implement systemic change.

Domestic violence service providers were the focus of 7 percent of system change activities, most likely to be screening and assessment protocol changes, training, or other checklist/guideline changes. However, domestic violence service providers had input on activities that were specifically focused on systems change in other systems, such as co-located advocates at child welfare agencies or information sharing practices within the justice system.

Although sites engaged in a number of activities necessary to build their collaboration and lay the foundation for the work, stakeholders indicated that needs assessments, relationship-building, and engaging the community were most critical to effectively planning the work. Needs assessments and gap analyses were key to identifying existing gaps and setting goals for the initiative. Collaborations perhaps underestimated the importance of building and maintaining collaborative relationships, as stakeholders reported that many related challengesincluding issues of power, trust, and leadershiphad to be reassessed continually throughout the initiative. Stakeholders reported that they should have devoted more time and attention from the beginning to communicating the message beyond collaborative partners and effectively engaging the community in the work. Most stakeholders reported the maintenance of collaborative relationships was the most important part of the work and required the most attention.

The co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment is well documented (American Medical Association, 1995; American Psychological Association, 1996; Coohey & Braun, 1997; Fantuzzo, DePaola, Lambert, Anderson, & Sutton, 1991; Wolfe & Korsch, 1994) with the empirical literature suggesting that child maltreatment occurs in 30 to 60 percent of families who experience domestic violence (Appel & Holden, 1998; Edleson, 1999). One explanation for the lack of clarity in these estimates is the variable, and sometimes nonexistent, screening and assessment practices of both child protective and domestic violence service agencies.

Relatively little is currently known about child welfare practice in assessing domestic violence, but research suggests that the problem is not always identified. One nationally representative study found that only 43% of families referred to the child welfare system are assessed for intimate partner violence, and 53% have a written policy for screening and assessing for domestic violence (Hazen et al., 2007). The National Association of Public Child Welfare Administrators (n.d.) recommends that domestic violence screenings occur during intake and that domestic violence assessments should occur during all phases of a case from service plan development, placement decision, services review, to case closure. Greenbook recommendations specify that caseworker training should focus on increasing awareness of domestic violence issues, improving identification, and providing appropriate intervention. Research suggests that training programs using detailed curricula developed specifically for addressing domestic violence within the child welfare system may have a positive impact on workers knowledge and attitudes regarding domestic violence screening and assessment. In one study, Mills and Yoshihama (2002) found that following training, child welfare workers were more likely to recognize the importance of assessing for domestic violence and felt more confident in their ability to work effectively with families affected by domestic violence. Other research has indicated that child welfare personnel who participated in domestic violence training felt that they had greater empathy for victims of domestic violence, would be more likely to assess for domestic violence, and would be more likely to recommend that domestic violence perpetrators receive specialized services (Saunders & Anderson, 2000).

In this chapter, data collected from child protective services case files and direct service workers are presented to depict each Greenbook initiative sites screening and assessment policies and procedures. The chapter also includes a discussion of lessons learned related to screening and assessment practices across demonstration sites over time.

Greenbook Recommendations

The following recommendations from The Greenbook are particularly relevant to screening and assessment.

Recommendation 25. Community agencies providing services to families within the child protective services caseload should have procedures in place to screen every family member privately and confidentially for domestic violence and to provide help to them, including safety planning and meeting basic human needs.

Baseline and follow-up case file reviews and direct service worker survey data were compared using t-tests and chi square statistics to test for significant changes over time when sample sizes were sufficient. Descriptive analyses (i.e., comparing measures at baseline and follow-up) also were used to explore systems change. To explain any observed changes in policy and practice in the child welfare system, qualitative data from stakeholder interviews and implementation activity catalogs were coded and analyzed as they related to specific vehicles for implementing system change (e.g., training, specialized positions, new protocols), challenges and facilitators encountered, and the timing and extent of implementation in the child welfare agency.

This section describes screening and assessment practices in child welfare agencies and domestic violence service providers. All quantitative data were collected in five of the six demonstration sites.

Greenbook demonstration sites implemented a number of activities to create or improve screening and assessment protocols at intake and throughout the operations of child protection agencies. Some activities provided guidance for determining child placement in cases of domestic violence or offered services and support for children of families involved in domestic violence situations. Data obtained from the direct service worker survey revealed a non-significant increase in the proportion of child welfare caseworkers who agreed that their agency regularly used a screening and assessment tool at intake. The largest increases were observed in El Paso, Grafton, and Lane counties. Evidence of screening for domestic violence in the case files was highly variable across sites. This section describes data about active screening (e.g., screening at intake) and passive screening (e.g., documentation in a case file or from other sources) practices and the overall co-occurrence of child maltreatment and domestic violence.

Active Screening

Comparing cases opened in 2001 to those opened in 2005, there was a significant increase in the proportion of child welfare case files that showed evidence of active screening for domestic violence (i.e., domestic violence was indicated by the victim during an interview or on a form as a part of the child welfare case), although the upward trend peaked in 2003 and decreased between 2003 and 2005. Santa Clara and St. Louis counties both had significantly higher levels of active screening for domestic violence in 2005 compared to 2001, while El Paso had an initial significant increase in active screening from 2001 to 2003, followed by a significant drop below its 2001 level in 2005. The proportion of cases with evidence of active screening decreased in Lane County during the initiative (from 35% in 2001 to 27% in 2005). Grafton County mandated active screening throughout the initiative and, therefore, 100 percent of the cases were screened for domestic violence at each measurement point. Figure IV-1 illustrates the variability of the demonstration sites on this measure.

The child welfare agency in Grafton County already had a domestic violence screening protocol in place prior to the initiative, but the Greenbook initiative helped create guidelines to shift from screening and assessment to investigation and case planning. Lane County implemented screening at many points in a child welfare case through its Guided Assessment Process, and St. Louis County implemented a two-tier process to first screen for warning signs of domestic violence then more thoroughly assess victims of family violence, where indicated.

El Paso County added domestic violence questions to its child protection intake protocol in 2002, implemented training for hotline workers, and instituted guidelines for investigating and responding to domestic violence cases. Improvements at this site likely were attributable to the fact that TESSA (originally an acronym for Trust, Education, Safety, Support, and Action), the primary domestic violence service provider in El Paso County and member of the Greenbook collaborative, added child welfare screening items to its intake protocol, including an entire section on child behavioral indicators. Other changes included moving questions about the child to the front of the intake protocol and replacing language in the protocol that was deemed to be judgmental with language that could be considered more objective.

Although all sites implemented revised or new child welfare screening tools to assess for domestic violence at intake, the quantitative data showed that these tools were not routinely used. High staff turnover at child welfare agencies, as well as the timing of implementation activities, may explain the lack of change found in caseworker reports and case files over time. Child welfare active screening and passive identification for domestic violence was at its height at the midpoint of the initiative. This may indicate difficulties in consistent implementation and the need to continually provide training on and emphasize this area until it becomes institutionalized in child welfare agencies. In St. Louis County, comprehensive training on the domestic violence assessment tool did not happen until 2005, and the site was still exploring how best to implement and train on the tool. Likewise, Lane County did not fully implement the changes to its Guided Assessment Process until 2005, and El Paso County found that continual training and reinforcement were necessary for the revised screening tool to be used regularly at intake. Across sites, translating policy into practice to actively screen for domestic violence and maintaining that practice proved to be an obstacle. A great amount of resources and energy were devoted to changing domestic violence screening and assessment practices in child welfare agencies, but sites needed to conduct training to ensure full implementation before these activities could be sustained and institutionalized among caseworkers.

Passive Screening

Passive identification of domestic violence involves the discovery of domestic violence documentation in a case file or from other sources. Passive discovery of domestic violence can transpire, for instance, if there is documentation of domestic violence found in restraining orders, hospital records, police reports, voluntary victim disclosures, notes from conversations with a domestic violence advocate, evidence that a family member used domestic violence services, and/or psychiatric or mental health evaluations that reference a history of domestic violence. There was an overall improvement across sites in the level of passive identification; however, there was also high variability across sites on this measure. From 2001 to 2003, there was a significant increase in the proportion of case files that showed passive identification of domestic violence, a significant decrease from 2003 to 2005, and a non-significant increase from 2001 to 2005. Figure IV-2 illustrates the proportion of case files with a history of domestic violence passively identified.

El Paso County and Santa Clara County had the largest increases in passive domestic violence identification over all three time periods. Grafton County and Lane County saw a general decline in the rate of passive domestic violence identification over the course of the initiative, and the rate of passive identification did not change significantly over time in St. Louis County.

Overall Rates of Co-occurrence

For the purposes of this study, co-occurrence is defined as circumstances in which a child has been maltreated concurrently or within a year of the childs parent or primary caregiver experiencing intimate partner violence. Analyses of data collected in 2001 and 2003 found a non-significant increase in the number of case file review forms across demonstration sites that revealed the co-occurrence of child maltreatment and domestic violence. Significance tests that compared 2003 and 2005 data, as well as 2001 and 2005 data, revealed a significant decrease in the incidence of cases with co-occurring child maltreatment and domestic violence.

To provide further context to the co-occurrence findings described above, it is important to examine variables that were used in the co-occurrence calculations. For instance, the significant decrease in co-occurrence cases in 2005, compared to 2003, may be due to the fact that there was also a significant decrease in the frequency of cases during that time in which the domestic violence victim was the childs primary caregiver. Similarly, the significant decrease in co-occurrence incidents in 2005, compared to 2001, may be correlated with the significant decrease in the frequency of cases in which a domestic violence incident occurred within a year of child maltreatment. Table IV-1 summarizes results from significance tests performed on variables related to the rate of co-occurrence across demonstration sites.

Across demonstration sites, there was a co-occurrence of child maltreatment and domestic violence in 23 percent of cases in 2001, 24 percent of cases in 2003, and 17 percent of cases in 2005. There was high variability across sites. The significant decline in the identification of co-occurrence across demonstration sites during the latter part of the initiative was surprising given that all the sites implemented changes to domestic violence screening and assessment protocols. It was hypothesized that these changes would translate into higher rates of identified co-occurrence over the course of the initiative, but evaluation findings did not support this hypothesis. This is likely due to the fact that there was inconsistent training and implementation associated with the screening and assessment protocols throughout the initiative.

Direct service workers from domestic violence service provider organizations were asked whether active screening for child maltreatment took place with families who sought help at domestic violence shelters. At baseline, 61 percent of direct service workers from domestic violence service providers reported across sites that written policies at their agencies covered screening for child maltreatment. From baseline to follow-up, there was a non-significant increase associated with this measure. Specifically, at follow-up 66 percent of direct service workers from domestic violence service providers reported that their agency had written policies for child maltreatment screening. However, there was wide variation in this measure across sites and over time. For example, in Grafton, Lane, and Santa Clara counties, there was a decrease over time in the percentage of domestic violence direct service worker survey respondents who reported that their agency had written guidelines for child maltreatment screening. In El Paso and St. Louis counties, there was an increase in the percentage of respondents who stated that their domestic violence service agency had child maltreatment screening guidelines. Figure IV-3 illustrates these findings in more detail.

Figure IV-3: Domestic Violence Service Providers with Written Guidelines for Child Maltreatment Screening

Note: A site name was not designated in four direct service worker surveys during baseline and five direct service worker surveys during follow-up. Findings from these surveys were not included in this figure; however, they were included in the overall calculation across sites.

Evaluation data suggest that child welfare agencies at many sites made significant gains in having written guidelines concerning the reporting of domestic violence, which reflects the considerable resources and energy that were devoted to changing screening and assessment practices in child welfare agencies. Significantly more caseworkers agreed at follow-up that their agency had written guidelines concerning the reporting of domestic violence. Child welfare case files also showed significant increases from time 1 to time 3 in the proportion of cases with evidence of active screening for domestic violence, although this measure peaked at time 2. Case files showed relatively low rates of co-occurring child maltreatment and domestic violence, in which the substantiated child maltreatment occurred within 1 year of a domestic violence incident against the childs primary caregiver. The lower rates of co-occurrence found in the demonstration sites, compared to those reported elsewhere, were likely a reflection of the definition of co-occurrence used in this study.

The recommendations contained in The Greenbook set forth guidance for communities to work at creating a system of services that promotes safety, assists and empowers victims of domestic violence, protects children at risk of maltreatment, keeps these children in the care of the nonoffending parent, and promotes offender accountability. This chapter examines the extent to which primary systems involved with the Greenbook initiative undertook efforts to ensure the safety and advocacy of child and adult victims of violence. The chapter concludes with a discussion of lessons learned from demonstration sites related to the safety of and advocacy for child and adult victims.

The findings presented in this chapter are from scaled survey questions designed to capture perceptions of direct service workers and stakeholders; reviews from child welfare case files; interviews with stakeholders; and implementation activities reported by sites. Appendix D discusses the analysis method in more detail.

Most of the tables presented in this chapter show the extent to which measures changed over time (e.g., significant improvement, non-significant improvement). Mean scores for measures are presented if the values were particularly high or low relative to the other mean scores. Appendix D contains tables with the mean scores for each measure discussed in this section.

The findings related to safety and advocacy are discussed in separate sections for each of the three systems. The sections for each system discuss the following topics:

Staff training and knowledge about co-occurence: Training about co-occurrence is fundamental to initiating and sustaining improvements. High staff turnover rates mean that many agencies must present training to ensure that staff maintain a repeatedly, consistent approach to addressing co-occurrence. This training can strain already taxed resources. A recent study about the relationship between child welfare agencies and courts reported that cross-training and other coordinated training across systems is not just important for skill acquisition among staff, but also aids in collaboration by creating a shared knowledge and language base across systems and disciplines (Carnochan et al, 2007).

Case-level information sharing: In addition to general communication among systems previously described in the Collaboration chapter, The Greenbook offers recommendations on how staff can improve the communication across systems in their day-to-day work with families. Although increased communication has led some staff in child welfare agencies and domestic violence service providers to be concerned about confidentiality protections, sites have addressed these worries through implementing standard confidentiality practices such as requiring consent forms and establishing clear policies about information sharing.

Case-level collaboration: Stakeholders and caseworkers were asked the extent to which agencies worked closely with staff from the other systems. Examples of case-level collaboration discussed in this section include domestic violence advocates who work in the child welfare agency or court system, and inclusion of domestic violence service providers in child welfare case conferences.

Placement and case planning: This topic applies only to child welfare agencies and presents findings related to agency policy about children remaining safely with the non-offending parent, and whether agencies conducted criminal records and order of protection checks. This section provides several examples from sites about this work.

Services and support: Although this topic covers a broad range of activities related to serving and supporting adult victims and their children, the data give the reader an overall sense of the extent to which each of the three systems has implemented internal changes to how they address co-occurrence.

This section provides information about staff training and knowledge about co-occurrence, case information sharing, case collaboration with domestic violence service providers, placement and case planning, and services and supports.

Staff Training and Knowledge About Co-occurrence

Caseworkers who responded to the direct service worker survey were asked to report on the number of training hours they had received in topic areas such as domestic violence, cultural competency, reasonable efforts, co-occurrence, and the impact of domestic violence on children. Comparisons of baseline and follow-up data identified significant increases over time in the number of training hours child welfare caseworkers received in these areas. Caseworkers reported receiving the least amount of training in reasonable efforts during both time periods and the most amount of training in domestic violence at follow-up. Table V-1 provides details on these measures.

As displayed in Table V-2, child welfare caseworkers also were asked if their agency regularly trained staff to understand, recognize, and respond to domestic violence. There was a non-significant increase associated with this measure from baseline (mean = 2.66, or disagree) to follow-up (mean = 2.87, or disagree). When asked if caseworkers were trained regularly to understand, recognize, and respond to domestic violence, stakeholders had more positive views of the improvements in training than direct service workers did. The mean score increased from 6.00, or disagree, at baseline to 7.37, or disagree, at follow-up, representing a significant increase over time.

Examples of training included an online practice program, training on basic domestic violence dynamics and issues specific to battered women, modules for new caseworkers to provide advanced assessment, and engagement guidelines for working with domestic violence victims, children, and batterers. In addition, one site mandated training in 2006 that focused on safety planning, contextualizing domestic violence, and batterer accountability.

Case-level Information Sharing

Descriptive analyses were performed for child welfare cases with co-occurring incidents of child maltreatment and domestic violence to depict general trends over time related to information sharing practices and confidentiality procedures. Across the demonstration sites, there was very little change over time as to whether consent forms were present in a case file. About 45 percent of cases, at all three data collection points and across all demonstration sites, included consent forms outlining information-sharing practices and confidentiality procedures. In addition to determining the presence of consent forms, the case file review provided information about whether there were any other written documents or references to confidentiality. There was little variation across the demonstration sites in the frequency of case files that referenced confidentiality forms. Approximately one-half of the child welfare cases with co-occurring incidents of child maltreatment and domestic violence contained some type of reference to consent for information sharing.

In the direct service worker survey, child welfare caseworkers rated their agencys interaction with domestic violence service providers and the courts for the purposes of exchanging information and communication. As shown in Table V-3, respondents indicated there was no significant change in child welfare staff communication with domestic violence service providers or with the courts.

Stakeholders also were asked their perceptions of child welfare agencies information-sharing practices with other systems. As Table V-3 also shows, there was a significant increase over time in the mean score for stakeholders in the measure about the level of information sharing with domestic violence service organizations and a non-significant increase over time in stakeholders mean score in the measure about the level of information sharing with courts.

Overall, the child welfare information-sharing practices data were mixed, with slightly less than half of the case files showing evidence of information sharing and confidentiality documentation at all three data collection time points. There were fairly high mean scores for direct service workers at follow-up in this area (direct service worker mean score at follow-up = 3.32, or agree for sharing information with courts, and 3.15, or agree for sharing information with domestic violence service providers). For stakeholders, there was a significant improvement in the mean score for the measure about information-sharing practices between the child welfare system and domestic violence service providers. Additionally, although no significant improvement was seen over time, stakeholders reported a higher mean score at follow-up for the measure of information sharing between child welfare and the courts than for any other child welfare measure reported in this Safety and Advocacy section. (Stakeholder mean score at follow-up was 8.93, or neither agree nor disagree.)

Confidentiality concerns around sharing information arose as sites instituted new activities to address co-occurrence. For instance, implementing multi-displinary case reviews and hiring domestic violence advocates housed in the child welfare system were common activities associated with improving case-level collaboration (discussed in more detail below), both of which often included the expectation that domestic violence service providers would discuss specific cases with child welfare agency staff. A basic philosophy of the domestic violence service provider community is to facilitate a safe environment for victims by ensuring confidentiality. Stakeholders in all demonstration sites noted that this philosophy was often perceived as being at odds with exchanging information with child welfare staff. Sites implemented cross-trainings on confidentiality and constraints of partner agency to help staff understand each others organizational policies, mandates, and general operating environments.

Case-level Collaboration with Domestic Violence Service Providers

Child welfare agency caseworkers were asked about the extent to which they collaborated with domestic violence service providers. There was a significant increase from baseline (mean = 2.91, or disagree) to follow-up (mean = 3.15, or agree) in the mean score of caseworkers who agreed that their agency worked closely with domestic violence service providers to address the issue of co-occurrence. There was a non-significant increase from baseline (mean = 2.62, or disagree) to follow-up (mean = 2.82, or disagree) in the mean score of caseworkers who felt that domestic violence service providers were included in child welfare case conferences, as Table V-4 illustrates.

Stakeholders also were asked about the participation of domestic violence service providers in child welfare casework. There was a significant increase in stakeholders agreement that child welfare agencies worked closely with domestic violence service providers to address the issue of the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment. There was a non-significant increase in stakeholders agreement that domestic violence service provider staff were included in formal child protective case conferences.

Compared to the other child welfare measures discussed in the Safety and Advocacy" (Section V), direct service worker and stakeholder survey data showed the largest improvement from baseline to follow-up in the degree to which respondents agreed that child welfare agencies worked closely with domestic violence service providers to address the issue of co-occurrence. This progress was tempered, however, by the other measure relating to collaborating with domestic violence service providers, which asked about the extent to which domestic violence service providers were included in child welfare case conferences: This measure had the lowest mean score at follow-up for both surveys when compared with the rest of the child welfare measures for this Safety and Advocacy section .(Direct service worker survey mean score at follow-up was 2.82, or disagree and stakeholder survey mean score at follow-up was 6.39, or neither agree nor disagree.)

Advocates housed in child welfare agencies was one common activity that may have contributed to significant improvements associated with child welfare staff working closely with domestic violence service providers. Some sites already had co-located advocates, but stakeholders in these sites reported that the roles of these advocates were better defined as a result of the Greenbook initiative. For instance, stakeholders from one site reported that few child welfare agency caseworkers knew how to use the co-located advocate, so the site implemented policies and protocols to formalize her role and one-on-one activities to show caseworkers the utility of the co-located advocate for case planning and for services and support for domestic violence victims. Another site initially featured a case-carrying co-located advocate, but soon expanded this role to activities such as implementing a system-wide needs assessment, providing advocacy during home visits, and participating in multidisciplinary team meetings.

Although quantitative data suggests that sites were not effectively including domestic violence service providers in child welfare case conferences, three sites reported implementing multidisciplinary case review teams that met regularly and focused on some of the most complex or severe co-occurrence cases. One site initiated, but was unable to sustain a multidisciplinary review team due to differing expectations of domestic violence service provider and child welfare agency staff on the team. Stakeholders reported that the child welfare agencys bureaucratic structure made it difficult to implement this activity in a timeframe that met the priorities and resources of the local collaboration. This site also encountered confidentiality concerns related to sharing case-level information as they attempted to implement this activity. The experiences of this site may highlight the difficulties encountered when communities try to move collaboration from higher, system level activities to the realities of daily practice by staff that serve and support families.

Placement and Case Planning

The Greenbook recommended that findings of domestic violence must be taken into account when making placement decisions for children and when assessing and responding to any possible child harm resulting from exposure to domestic violence (Schechter & Edleson, 1999). In their review of the issue of child witnessing domestic violence, Appel and Appel (2006) note that some experts believe that whenever a child witnesses domestic violence they experience a form of psychological child abuse, while others maintain that automatically classifying exposure to violence as child abuse does not allow consideration of the adult victims attempts to keep the child safe. The authors contend that both sides of this debate agree that a full assessment of the childs safety should be conducted whenever domestic violence is present. At the beginning of the Greenbook initiative, many sites already were discussing issues, such as allowing a child to remain with a domestic violence victim who may be viewed as failing to protect the child, as well as the implications of a child witnessing domestic violence. Across sites, there was a significant increase from baseline (mean = 2.50, or disagree) to follow-up (mean = 2.82, or disagree) in the mean score of caseworkers who agreed that their agency had a written policy that stated when children could remain safely with the non-offending parent. There was also a significant increase in the mean score of stakeholders who agreed that the child welfare agency in their site had a written policy about children remaining safely with the non-offending parent (baseline mean score = 5.53, or disagree and follow-up mean score = 6.60, or neither agree nor disagree). These findings are summarized in Table V-5.

Another measure related to placement asked child welfare workers whether their agency conducted criminal records and order of protection checks. Despite this measure having a relatively high average score at both baseline (mean = 3.15, or agree) and follow-up (mean = 3.02, or agree), the mean scores decreased slightly over time, as seen in Table V-5.

The demonstration sites implemented a number of activities to respond to a child witnessing domestic violence and to ensure child safety in domestic violence situations. Lane County augmented its Domestic Violence Child Witness Project to include a domestic violence advocate meeting with the adult victim during the forensic interview of the child. Other activities included evidence gathering and safety planning. A local evaluation found that very few families involved in the project had subsequent referrals for domestic violence. Grafton County held a Childrens Exposure to Domestic Violence forum in 2002 and had ongoing discussions about when exposure to domestic violence rises to the level of child maltreatment.

Sites also implemented guidelines to ensure the safety of children in domestic violence situations. In St. Louis County, the Child Order of Protection Protocol was used to remove a batterer from the home when the batterer was deemed to be a danger to the child (child witnessing alone is not sufficient). Grafton County stakeholders reported that child welfare staff had better used their ability to have a perpetrator removed from the home. El Paso Countys screening and assessment tool focuses on appropriate placement of children involved in domestic violence situations by providing guidance about removing a child, temporary custody issues, issues related to battering fathers, and how to work with mothers who may be experiencing a variety of challenges. The significant increase in the mean score of caseworkers and stakeholders who agreed that their agency had a written policy stating when children could remain safely with the non-offending parent may have been driven by the forensic interviewing and child order of protection activities implemented by several sites. Despite the improvement evident from baseline to follow-up, this measure had a very low mean score for both stakeholders (mean score at follow-up = 6.60, or neither agree nor disagree) and caseworkers (mean score at follow-up = 2.82, or disagree), indicating there is still much room for improvement.

Services and Support

Five measures asked caseworkers the extent to which their agency served and supported battered women by supporting battered women without labeling them neglectful, providing voluntary advocacy services, referring them to legal services, referring them to services promoting self-sufficiency, and referring them to and informing them about voluntary and community-based services. Stakeholders were not asked these questions.

The mean score of caseworkers across the sites who agreed that their agency offered support to battered women in a respectful way without unnecessarily labeling them as neglectful did not show much improvement from baseline (mean = 2.90, or disagree) to follow-up (mean = 2.98, or disagree). Lane County, however, showed the largest increase on this measure (mean = 2.80, or disagree at baseline and 3.11, or agree at follow-up), and Grafton and Santa Clara counties also showed increases. Significance tests were not performed on these data, however, due to insufficient site-specific sample sizes. Modest increases were found in the mean score of caseworkers who agreed that their agency provided voluntary advocacy services for battered women (mean = 2.89, or disagree at baseline and 3.05, or agree at follow-up) and in the mean score of caseworkers who agreed that their agency referred adult victims of domestic violence to legal services (mean = 3.05, or agree at baseline and 3.08, or agree at follow-up), with Grafton County and Santa Clara County showing the largest increases. High mean scores were found for two other measures over both time periodsreferrals for battered women to services that would promote self-sufficiency (mean = 3.16, or agree at baseline and 3.28, or agree at follow-up), and referrals to and information about voluntary and community-based services for adult victims (mean = 3.28 or agree at baseline and 3.34, or agree at follow-up). The measure about voluntary and community-based services had the highest mean score of any child welfare measure discussed in this Safety and Advocacy section. Table V-6 summarizes the change in means scores over time for the measures associated with child welfare services and supports.

During the case file review, each demonstration site abstracted data on the frequency and types of child welfare agency referrals and services for clients, including intimate partner violence victims and child maltreatment victims. Types of child welfare agency referrals and services included referrals to intimate partner violence shelters, victim witness services, law enforcement services or referrals, and intimate partner violence court intake services. Due to the small sample sizes of several types of referrals over the data collection periods, however, significance tests were only performed on the frequency of referrals made to treatment for domestic violence victims. A significant increase was found for this type of referral (35% at baseline to 65% at follow-up). All sites increased on this measure over time, except for St. Louis County.

Between baseline and follow-up, the demonstration sites implemented a number of activities to reduce victim blaming, enhance victim safety, and provide for victim advocacy. Safety plan guidelines and associated training were implemented to promote safety and protection while reducing victim blaming. A domestic violence checklist included services to be recommended in the child welfare client case plan when domestic violence was present and required separate plans to be created for each family member. The sites also implemented changes in court petition language to reduce blaming of the nonoffending parent. One site implemented new statewide guidelines that revised the criteria for the use of the threat of harm designation to minimize blaming the nonoffending parent, and included service planning strategies to keep the domestic violence victim safe and enhance her ability to keep her children safe. Domestic violence protocols were revised to require caseworkers to conduct safety planning with mothers, and a new standardized referral process included immediate referral to the domestic violence specialist housed in the child welfare agency. Screening and assessment protocols in one site included a determination of the lethality of the batterer and mandated safety planning procedures with battered mothers.

Overview of the Child Welfare System Safety and Advocacy Data

This section presents findings about the extent to which child welfare agencies improved how they responded to the safety and advocacy needs of families. In addition to qualitative data and findings from case file reviews, this section principally includes findings from six measures from the stakeholder survey and 12 measures from the direct service worker survey (completed by caseworkers). Four of the six stakeholder measures improved from baseline to follow-up, yet only two of the 12 direct service worker measures saw significant improvement. Despite few significant improvements being reported by caseworkers, all measures described in section 3.1 Safety and Advocacy in the Child Welfare System, except for one, saw some improvement over time. This may indicate that although progress may appear slow, child welfare experienced positive results in terms of safety and advocacy for adult victims. Across surveys, for measures that either saw large improvements over time or had very high mean scores at follow-up, child welfare agencies showed the most promise in the following measures:[8]

Child welfare agencies interacted with domestic violence organizations for the purposes of exchanging information and communication. (Caseworker mean score was relatively high at follow-up; stakeholders reported significant improvement over time.)

Child welfare agencies interacted with court agencies for the purposes of exchanging information and communication. (Stakeholder mean score was highest for this section; caseworker mean score was high.)

Child welfare agencies worked closely with domestic violence service providers to address issues associated with co-occurrence. (Caseworkers and stakeholders reported the largest improvement over time.)

Child welfare agencies referred adult victims to and informed them about voluntary and community-based services. (Caseworkers had the highest mean at follow-up.)

Analysis of the measures from both stakeholders and direct service workers showed only one measure had a low mean score that did not improve significantly over time, indicating that child welfare agencies still needed to improve how they included domestic violence service providers in formal child protective case conferences (lowest mean score for both stakeholders and caseworkers).

The following two measures showed mixed results, indicating areas possibly needing further attention:

Child welfare agencies had a policy clearly stating the criteria under which children can remain safely with non-abusing parents experiencing domestic violence. (Low mean scores, although mean score did improve significantly for both caseworkers and stakeholders.)

This section provides information about staff training and knowledge about co-occurrence, case information sharing, case collaboration with child welfare agencies, and services and supports, as well as an overview of the data.

Staff Training and Knowledge About Co-occurrence

Domestic violence service provider staff were asked the number of training hours they had received in topics such as child maltreatment, cultural competency, reasonable efforts, co-occurrence, and the impact of domestic violence on children. Comparisons of baseline and follow-up data found a significant increase in the amount of training staff had received in the 12 months prior to the survey in all the areas, as shown in Table V-7.

When direct service workers were asked if domestic violence service providers trained their staff regularly to understand, recognize, and respond to child maltreatment, there was a non-significant increase in the average ratings (mean = 2.75, or disagree at baseline and 2.87, or disagree at follow-up). There was, however, significant improvement over time in the mean score of stakeholders who were asked this question.

When domestic violence service provider staff were asked if staff in their agencies were knowledgeable about child welfare procedures, respondents at both baseline and follow-up agreed or strongly agreed (baseline mean score = 2.98, or disagree and follow-up mean score = 3.01, or agree). Given that a relatively large proportion of domestic violence service providers agreed and there were no significant changes over time, staff may have considered themselves knowledgeable about child welfare policy and practice prior to the Greenbook initiative. Table V-8 summarizes the change over time seen for measures about domestic violence service provider staff training and knowledge.

Case-level Information Sharing

Staff from domestic violence service providers reported the extent to which their agency interacts with the courts and child welfare agencies for the purposes of exchanging information and communication. The data showed a non-significant increase over time associated with these measures.

While staff perceptions of information-sharing practices did not change significantly over time, the mean score for stakeholders improved significantly over time for the measure of domestic violence service provider interaction with child welfare agencies. There was no significant change associated with the stakeholder mean score for interactions with the court system. Table V-9 illustrates findings from the stakeholder survey.

For stakeholders, the measure of domestic violence service providers interacting with child welfare to exchange information had a relatively high mean score (mean score at follow-up = 8.04, or neither agree nor disagree) and experienced a significant improvement from baseline to follow-up. This may reflect changes several sites made, such as developing memoranda of understanding and other information-sharing agreements between child welfare agencies and domestic violence service providers.

Case-level Collaboration with Child Welfare Agencies

Domestic violence service providers were asked to what extent they agreed that their agency worked with child welfare agencies in investigations, risk assessments, service planning, and safety planning. Non-significant decreases were associated with these measures over time. Additionally, the mean scores of these measures at follow-up are lower than any other domestic violence service provider staff measures discussed in this Safety and Advocacy section (mean scores ranging from 2.382.52, or disagree).

These findings may indicate that despite existing practices that involved domestic violence workers in child welfare case planning, no significant progress was made in this area during the Greenbook initiative. Because these data were based on domestic violence service workers perceptions, however, another explanation may be that workers became more aware of the complexities of collaboration and rated their agencies practices more critically over time. The second explanation may be more likely because data from the stakeholder surveys indicated that stakeholders perceptions of domestic violence service provider collaboration with child welfare agencies improved significantly from baseline to follow-up. In fact, the measure of service planning and safety planning saw the largest improvement over time for stakeholder measures relating to domestic violence service providers discussed in this Safety and Advocacy section. Additionally, an interesting finding is that the site with the lowest rating of working with child welfare staff also had the highest number of domestic violence agencies involved in the initiative, which may indicate that challenges for collaboration and coordination among multiple agencies. Table V-10 summarizes the change over time visible in measures relating to domestic violence service provider collaboration with child welfare agencies.

Despite these mixed results, sites reported activities that many domestic violence service providers implemented during the initiative, such as placing co-located staff at child welfare departments and the courts and working collaboratively with child welfare to conduct joint safety planning for clients.

Services and Support

Recent research (Gewirtz & Menakem, 2004) has emphasized several important areas of services and support that domestic violence agencies should implement, including establishing practice standards for working with children and mothers, conducting assessments with children; having dedicated staff (child advocates); securing funding for childcare and early childhood education programs; and home-based support for victims and children.

No significant improvement was found from baseline to follow-up in any of the six measures of the services and support domestic violence service providers provided to respond to co-occurrence. These measures, however, had the highest mean scores at follow-up compared to other measures asked of domestic violence staff discussed in this Safety and Advocacy section (mean scores ranged from 3.133.33, or agree).

The direct service worker mean score for the measure of domestic violence service providers offering child-friendly environments decreased significantly over timethe only direct service worker or stakeholder measure presented in this section that did. However, this finding was caused by one site reporting an unusually high mean score at baseline (with 81% of direct service workers rating this measure a 4, or strongly agree). At follow-up, this sites mean score was similar to scores for other sites (with 52% of direct service workers rating this measure a 4, or strongly agree). Even with the significant decrease, this measures mean score at follow-up (across sites) was higher than any other direct service worker survey measure about domestic violence service providers reported in this Safety and Advocacy section (mean score at follow-up = 3.33, or agree).

Significant improvement occurred over time in the mean score of stakeholders for the measure of domestic violence service providers offering a child-friendly environment for the families they served. Similar to the direct service worker findings, this measure had the highest mean score for stakeholders compared to the other measures about domestic violence service providers discussed in this Safety and Advocacy section (mean score at follow-up = 8.74, or neither agree nor disagree). Despite the progress shown in the quantitative data regarding domestic violence service providers offering a child-friendly environment, one stakeholder pointed to the tensions inherent in shifting focus to children, stating, We want to provide more direct services to children; however, we feel as though we cant, due to child service providers being mandated reporters. We feel this would hinder our services to the women, as they would not feel comfortable coming to us with their issues. Other interviewees indicated that significant philosophical shifts have been made in terms of attitudes toward reporting child maltreatment and viewing childrens needs as linked to but separate from mothers needs, but repeatedly stated that resource issues were a very significant barrier to engaging in more service provision. Another interviewee at the final site visit stated, I think were specific in our purpose with counseling. I think there are lots of other things [needed], but thats not what we are [there for].

There was a non-significant improvement for the measure about having well-trained, full-time advocates on staff to provide services or develop referral linkages for children of domestic violence victims. Table V-11 summarizes the change over time for mean scores of measures relating to services and supports offered by domestic violence service providers.

Overview of the Domestic Violence System Safety and Advocacy Data

Findings from both stakeholder and direct service worker surveys regarding the extent to which domestic violence service providers addressed safety and advocacy for families showed several measures that either saw large improvements or had high overall mean scores:[9]

Domestic violence service providers interacted with child welfare agencies for the purposes of exchanging information and communication. (Stakeholder mean score showed significant improvement and the highest mean score at follow-up.)

Domestic violence service providers worked with battered women who were involved with child protective services to help them understand what they could expect from child protective services regarding their children. (Direct service worker mean score was relatively high at follow-up.)

Domestic violence service providers offered a child-friendly environment for the families they served. (For both surveys, this measure had the highest mean score at follow-up; stakeholder mean score showed significant improvement.)

Domestic violence service providers have well-trained, full-time advocates on staff to deliver services or develop referral linkages for children of domestic violence victims. (Direct service worker mean score was relatively high at follow-up.)

Analysis of direct service worker survey data and stakeholder survey data revealed differences in several measures. The following measures had either little progress or low mean scores for direct service worker respondents, yet showed some progress or had high mean scores for stakeholders:

Domestic violence service providers interacted with courts for the purposes of exchanging information and communication.

Staff in domestic violence service providers worked jointly with child protective services agency staff in services planning and safety planning.

The measure about interacting with courts for the purposes of exchanging information and communication showed the least improvement over time of the mean score for stakeholders (compared to other stakeholder measures about domestic violence service providers discussed in this Safety and Advocacy section), yet showed the most improvement over time for direct service workers (compared to other direct service worker measures about domestic violence service providers discussed in this Safety and Advocacy section).

Domestic violence service providers have made some progress in addressing the safety and advocacy of families experiencing co-occurrence. But the lack of progress perceived by survey respondents, and the disparate results found between the two survey populations (domestic violence service staff who responded to the direct service worker survey and decision-makers from a variety of systems who responded to the stakeholder survey) indicated that much work is still needed, particularly in the areas of case-level collaboration with child welfare and services and supports.

This section provides information about staff training and knowledge about co-occurrence, case-level information sharing, and case-level collaboration, as well as an overview of the court data.

Staff Training and Knowledge About Co-occurrence

In their discussion of the courts role in protecting children exposed to domestic violence, Hitchens and van Horn (2005) point to the need for all judicial staff and other professionals involved in these cases to be better educated about the dynamics of domestic violence within families. Because of the amount of resources and time it takes to impart this knowledge through training, the authors note that it is imperative that the judicial leadership voice their commitment to educating themselves, court staff and attorneys.

Dependency court staff, including attorneys, batterer compliance coordinators, court case managers, and juvenile officers, who responded to the direct service workers survey reported during both time periods that the topics they received the most amount of training in were domestic violence and child maltreatment.[10] At follow-up, respondents hours of training varied across topics. There were non-significant increases in training on domestic violence, child maltreatment, cultural competency, and co-occurrence, and a non-significant decrease in training on the impact of domestic violence on children. Additionally, the mean total of training hours for court direct service worker respondents actually increased from baseline (16.88 hours) to follow-up (27.04 hours). Table V-12 highlights these findings in greater detail.

Dependency court staff also were asked to rate to what extent their agency participated in education or training on the effects of domestic violence on children and on the dynamics of the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment. Similar to the hours reported in these areas of training, there were small increases reported in these training topics over the course of the initiative.

As illustrated in Table V-13, the mean score for stakeholders increased slightly for the measure about judges participation in education and training on the effects of domestic violence on children, and increased significantly from baseline to follow-up for the measure about judges participation in education and training related to co-occurrence. Non-significant decreases were associated with three of the four direct service worker survey measures related to dependency court knowledge of various aspects of co-occurrence.

The mean scores for direct service workers were very high at baseline for the three measures related to knowledge (knowledgeable about the effects of domestic violence on adult victims, knowledgeable about the effects of domestic violence on children, and knowledgeable about the dynamics of co-occurrence), ranging from 3.273.46, or agree. These scores actually decreased at follow-up. The mean scores at baseline for the measures about training were much lower than the knowledge measures (both training measures had a mean score of 2.86, or disagree at baseline) but saw non-significant improvements over time.

All six sites implemented some form of Greenbook training for judges and other court personnel. Although some training was designed specifically for judges, the majority of training was directed at a variety of court staff, including attorneys, clerks, and bailiffs. One of the rural demonstration sites conducted training for parole and probation staff, and a mid-sized suburban site trained all mediators within the Court Office of Dispute. Most training was intended to improve staff awareness and knowledge of domestic violence and its impact on child protection cases. One of the urban sites provided additional training for judicial staff on cultural competency.

Judges and other court personnel from multiple sites spoke positively during interviews about Greenbook training. One judge reported, I have been in criminal law for 30 years, and I am still learning through Greenbook! Some judges say its the best training theyve ever had and that it helps them move forward with their work. When describing the impact of attending Greenbook trainings and collaborative meetings, one dependency court judge said, My eyes have been opened. Ive gained new perspectives about domestic violence and how insensitive [judges] can be.

Judges in three sites reported during interviews that the most helpful or most needed trainings were the cross-training activities that took place with other systems to better understand how domestic violence service providers and child welfare agencies operated. One judge mentioned that he felt the dependency court system had a good understanding of child welfare, but needed a better understanding of domestic violence service providers. Judges also reported that the Greenbook trainings, as well as interactions with domestic violence victim advocates and batterer intervention treatment providers at Greenbook meetings, helped them gain more in-depth knowledge about the constraints under which community agencies operated.

Case-level Information Sharing

Dependency court direct service workers were asked if they interacted with domestic violence service providers and child welfare agencies for the purposes of exchanging information and communication. There were no significant changes over time in the communication and interaction practices reported by dependency court staff, and the mean score for the measure of interaction with domestic violence service providers experienced a small decrease from baseline to follow-up. Dependency court staff also were asked to rate how well the courts and agencies balanced the safety and privacy concerns of all parties with the need to access potentially sensitive data about family members. Again, there was no significant improvement from baseline to follow-up. Dependency court personnel reported high levels of agreement at baseline for each of these measures; therefore, there was less room for improvement over time.

Respondents from both the stakeholder and direct service worker surveys reported higher mean scores for the measure of dependency courts sharing information with child welfare agencies than the measure of courts sharing information with domestic violence service providers, which may reflect the fact that dependency courts spent more time in their daily practice interacting with child welfare agencies than domestic violence service providers.[11]

Case-Level Collaboration

Better coordination among courts can make it easier to hold batterers accountable, manage the needs of and support for other family members, and increase the efficacy of courts to manage cases (Schechter & Edleson, 1999). Hitchens and van Horn (2005) recommend creating a protocol or local rule of court enabling the criminal and family law courts to share information. Despite the importance of inter-court collaboration, when direct service workers from the dependency court system were asked questions pertaining to their collaboration with other courts when there was more than one case involving the same family members or partners, there was a non-significant decrease in the dependency courts collaboration with other courts over the course of the initiative, as shown in Table V-15.

The lack of improvement seen in this measure over time and low mean score (follow-up mean score = 2.77, or disagree) showed that dependency courts needed to improve the way they collaborated with other courts.

Interviews with stakeholders from multiple systems also indicated that improving coordination among courts was not a major focus. While respondents identified changes in multiple courts (e.g., internal changes to both dependency courts and criminal courts within one site), few respondents mentioned how these courts worked together. When inter-court collaboration was mentioned, respondents most often cited the lack of collaboration or coordination among courts. For example, a district attorney reported, The biggest disappointment within the courts is that I saw the potential for The Greenbook to develop a web of communications in these family casesso that judges actually had all the information on the family.

Overall, there were few changes associated with inter-court collaboration; however, one demonstration site created a position, court case coordinator through the Dependency and Neglect Court, to address this issue. The court case coordinator collected information on the behavior and criminal history of the parties to share across courts, which allowed dependency courts to ask fewer questions of the non-offending parent, and identified interfering current orders for cases in front of a judge. Additionally, families used the court case coordinator as a source of information about their current court orders and community resources. However, the court case coordinator position was terminated in April 2004 when the collaboration could no longer support a full-time position and after the collaboration learned that a State plan had been initiated to automate the information gathered by the court case coordinator.

Services and Support

While dependency courts may not provide services directly to families, The Greenbook offered several ways courts can help ensure families are safe, served appropriately, and that reasonable efforts are made to keep children with or return them to their family.

Service plans are used in dependency cases to outline steps that parents need to take to retain or regain custody of their children (Schechter & Edleson, 1999). Dependency court personnel were asked to rate to what extent the dependency court required child welfare agencies to ensure that separate service plans were created for the perpetrators and victims of domestic violence. There was a non-significant increase over time in the mean score of dependency court personnel who agreed that the dependency court required child welfare agencies to create separate service plans. The fact that this measure had a high mean score at baseline (baseline mean score = 3.15, or agree) suggested that dependency courts may already have required separate service plans.

Interviews with dependency court judges in three sites indicated that separate case plans for victim and perpetrator were the norm over the course of the initiative, which coincided with direct service worker survey findings suggesting there was little change and a high level of agreement reported across demonstration sites over time. However, one judge indicated that over the course of the initiative, service plans better reflected the unique dynamics and needs of a family. This judge reported that this was due to the fact that judges became more likely to seek out information regarding the case beyond what was presented in a case plan.

Dependency court personnel were asked to describe to what extent their dependency court held a child welfare agency accountable for making reasonable efforts to avoid removal of children from their homes and making reasonable efforts to achieve reunification. There was a non-significant improvement over time in the mean scores for both of these measures. Despite minimal changes associated with these measures, the mean scores at baseline were relatively high (baseline mean score for reasonable efforts to avoid removing children from home = 3.03, or agree and baseline mean score for reasonable efforts to achieve reunification = 3.15, or agree).

Interviews with judges enhanced understanding of the extent to which they invoked the reasonable efforts Federal statute, as recommended by The Greenbook. The interviews revealed that judges in all demonstration sites were reluctant to invoke the reasonable efforts provision because of its consequences for child welfare agency funding and because they could exercise some flexibility with the Federal time constraint statute if they determined that clients had made a good faith effort to change and/or if agencies did not provide appropriate services. Furthermore, judges at two demonstration sites indicated that The Greenbook broadened their awareness of ways by which a batterer can undermine a victims ability to comply with a service plan.

Dependency court personnel were asked to describe to what extent the dependency court took every reasonable measure to keep domestic violence victims safe. There was a non-significant decrease over time associated with this measure. Despite the fact that outcome data suggested little change over time, many judges involved with the initiative reported that they adopted new practices and took steps to ensure the safety of adult and child victims of violence both within and outside their courtrooms. All judges involved with Greenbook who were interviewed during the last year of the initiative indicated that actions were taken to help ensure the safety of adult victims appearing in their courtrooms. Interviews with child welfare and domestic violence service provider respondents also indicated increased sensitivity to safety issues, including not putting the victims address on the court petition and reviewing the layout of courtrooms and waiting rooms.

Dependency court personnel were asked to describe the extent to which the dependency court encouraged use of a domestic violence victim advocate for the battered mother in all dependency cases involving allegations of domestic violence. Because only one site had a domestic violence victim advocate in the dependency court, cross-site data relating to this measure were less meaningful.[12] Not surprisingly, for sites without domestic violence victim advocacy in the courtroom, direct service worker survey data revealed little change over time and relatively low mean scores for this measure (baseline mean score for sites with no advocate = 2.54, or disagree and follow-up mean score for sites with no advocate = 2.59, or disagree).

One site hired a domestic violence victim advocate to work regularly with victims in the dependency court setting. A judge arranged for the child welfare agency to hire a consultant with domestic violence service experience who was available to any victim wanting such assistance. As someone who was not working for the court or governed by State confidentiality laws, the domestic violence victim advocate was not expected to provide information to the court. The advocate was available to victims engaged in litigation in other courts. The position existed throughout most of the Greenbook initiative and judges indicated the advocate was effective in supporting battered parents in becoming safer. This position may be one factor that led dependency court personnel at this site to report slightly higher mean scores for this measure (baseline mean score for site with advocate = 2.8, or disagree and follow-up mean score for site with advocate = 2.75, or disagree).

Despite dependency court personnel perceptions at this site that a domestic violence victim advocate in the court was a valuable resource for both judges and families, there was concern within the domestic violence service community that the position did not truly reflect advocacy. A stakeholder from a domestic violence service organization reflected:

In our community, weve had a lot of conversations about what advocacy is people dont have a clear understanding about our philosophy of what advocacy is and people within the domestic violence service provider community have different philosophiesWe need to have clarity about how we work with women. For example, we had a project specific to advocacy, looking at advocacy in the courts. There was a lot of conflict, and the end result has been less clarity the model were leaning toward is not systems advocacy, which is giving women what they want without challenging the system.

The rift within the domestic violence community in this site demonstrates the tension between making advocacy accessible to families within the courtroom with the concern of having the advocates role become so institutionalized within a formal system that their ability to speak up for victims is compromised.

Overview of the Court Safety and Advocacy Data

This section presents findings about the extent to which dependency courts improved how they responded to the safety and advocacy needs of families. Compared to the quantitative data presented for child welfare agencies and domestic violence service providers, service and advocacy measures for dependency courts saw the least amount of significant improvement over time (the only measure that improved significantly over time was the stakeholder measure of judges participating in education/training on the dynamics of co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment). Across surveys, among measures that either saw improvements over time or had very high mean scores at follow-up, dependency courts showed the most promise in the following measures:[13]

Judges in the dependency court participated in education/training on the effects of domestic violence on children. (Direct service worker mean scores improved the most over time.)

Judges in the dependency court participated in education/training on the dynamics of the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment. (Stakeholder mean scores showed the only significant improvement over time.)

Judges in the dependency court were knowledgeable about the effects of domestic violence on children. (Direct service worker score was highest mean at follow-up; stakeholder score was also high.)

Judges in the dependency court interacted with child welfare agencies for the purposes of exchanging information and communication. (Stakeholder mean score was highest mean at follow-up; direct service worker score was also high.)

Two measures had low mean scores that did not improve over time:

Judges in the dependency court interacted with domestic violence service providers for the purposes of exchanging information and communication.

The dependency court collaborated with other courts when there was more than one case involving the same family members or parties.

Similar to the data reported for the two other systems, the findings about dependency courts were fairly inconsistent, with the data from direct service worker surveys and stakeholder surveys yielding different results on similar measures. One explanation for this discrepancy is that dependency court personnel who completed the direct service worker survey tended to report higher ratings at baseline, leaving less room for improvement compared to stakeholders who typically reported lower ratings at baseline. Although sites reported that some systems change activities occurred in the dependency court system, particularly in the area of staff training, the level of activity that took place was considerably lower relative to the levels reported for the two other systems. During interviews, stakeholders identified several challenges that may have contributed to the lack of progress in the dependency court system, including difficulty working with certain judges and the legal limitations that prohibit judges from making sweeping changes.

In recent years, batterer accountability has increasingly become a focus for professionals working to promote the safety and well-being of adult and child victims of violence. Batterer accountability typically is defined as attributing responsibility for violence to the perpetrator of the violence. The phrase batterer accountability also is used to prevent victim blaming, especially with families experiencing the co-occurrence of child maltreatment and domestic violence (Goodmark, 2005). Batterer accountability requires ensuring that children will no longer be exposed to further violence (Goodmark, 2005). Maderos (2004) emphasizes the important role child welfare agencies play in increasing batterer accountability. Maderos (2004) describes how the assessment of dangerousness with abusers is a critical aspect of child welfare interventions and can help inform service plans for the abuser, safety plans for victims and children, and can help enhance safety for caseworkers.

At the time The Greenbook was written, batterer accountability was just beginning to gain attention within the judicial, child welfare, and domestic violence systems. Consequently, 4 of the 67 Greenbook recommendations specifically address this issue and provide guidance to programs regarding perpetrators of domestic violence. Although batterer accountability was not a large focus of The Greenbook, all six Greenbook initiative sites indicated that batterer accountability was a focal point. In response to the emphasis demonstration sites placed on batterer accountability, the national evaluation developed measures to assess the extent to which stakeholders from each demonstration site felt that the primary systems involved with Greenbook were holding batterers accountable for violence.

This chapter presents data collected from direct service worker surveys, case file reviews, and stakeholder interviews, and describes the extent to which primary systems involved with the Greenbook initiative held batterers accountable for violence. Chi square tests were used to identify significant changes over time associated with direct service worker survey data and case file review data.

Quantitative findings were collected in five of the six demonstration sites. (San Francisco County was unable to participate in follow-up quantitative data collection activities.) Baseline and follow-up data were compared using t-tests and Chi square statistics to test for significant changes over time where sample sizes were sufficient.

Child welfare caseworkers were asked whether their agency records information in a way that holds perpetrators accountable for harm. There was little change on this measure over time (approximately 65% of child welfare caseworkers agreed at baseline and follow-up), with low agreement rates in El Paso, St. Louis, and Santa Clara counties indicating this was an area that needed attention in the non-rural sites. Approximately 90 percent of caseworkers across sites and across time agreed that their agency referred perpetrators to batterer intervention programs, but there was great variability across sites on this measure with El Paso, Lane, and Santa Clara counties showing decreases over time and Grafton and St. Louis counties showing improvements. There was a slight decrease in the proportion of caseworkers across sites who agreed that their agencies monitored batterer attendance and compliance with court and program requirements (from 88% at baseline to 84% at follow-up), although Grafton County showed an increase on this measure (from 84% at baseline to 96% at follow-up).

There was a significant increase over time across sites in case file evidence of batterer referrals. This overall increase was driven by the changes shown in El Paso, Lane, and Grafton counties. Low values at baseline on this measure reflected the need of child welfare agencies to focus on actively engaging and working with batterers. Santa Clara County had high levels of referrals for batterers throughout the study period.

El Paso County offered training on ongoing patterns of coercive control, which are often used by batterers to manipulate caseworkers. El Paso County also used a fathering-after-violence consultant to help workers negotiate the challenges of working with batterers.

Lane County hired a batterer accountability specialist to provide job training, consultation, role modeling, and debriefing with caseworkers about working with men who batter.

Grafton County implemented training for new caseworkers to address accountability and its connection with abusive men, engagement, and case planning.

St. Louis County held a 2-day conference, Men Who Batter, which featured a panel of local batterer intervention program providers who presented information to Greenbook system partners about program content, referral processes, and treatment standards.

Santa Clara County implemented a voluntary domestic violence checklist to track police reports and restraining orders, although this checklist may not have been fully implemented because it was voluntary. Stakeholders in this site reported that child welfare agencies were working more closely with probation and parole to learn about a perpetrators parole conditions and whether they were required to attend a batterer intervention program.

In addition to examining to what extent caseworkers felt the child welfare system held batterers accountable, the national evaluation team also asked court workers about the extent to which the dependency court was holding batterers accountable and ensuring the safety of child and adult victims of violence. Court workers who completed the direct service worker survey were asked to describe to what extent the dependency court required child welfare workers to ensure that separate service plans for the perpetrator and the victims of domestic violence were developed. Over time, there was a non-significant increase (from 85% at baseline to 90% at follow-up) in the percentage of court workers who agreed on this measure, but there was great variability associated with this measure across sites. There were increases in agreement over time in Lane and St. Louis counties; in El Paso and Santa Clara counties, there were non-significant decreases in the percentage of court workers who agreed. Figure VI-1 details court workers responses across sites during both data collection periods.

Figure VI-1: "The dependency court requires child welfare agencies to create separate service plans for the perpetrator and the victim of domestic violence."

Note: There were seven direct service worker surveys completed during follow-up for which a site name was not designated. Findings from these surveys are not included in this figure, but they were included in the overall calculation across sites.

Court personnel who completed the direct service worker survey also were asked to describe to what extent the dependency court held perpetrators of domestic violence accountable. Over time, there was a non-significant decrease, from 89 percent at baseline to 74 percent at follow-up, in the percentage of court workers who agreed with this statement; however, there was great variability across sites. El Paso, Lane, and Santa Clara counties showed little change over time, but there was a large decrease in St. Louis County (from 78% at baseline to 29% at follow-up). Figure VI-2 provides additional information on court worker responses by site and over time.

Note: There were seven direct service worker surveys completed during follow-up for which a site name was not designated. Findings from these surveys are not included in this figure, but they were included in the overall calculation across sites.

One explanation for the large decrease in the percentage of St. Louis County caseworkers who reported that the dependency court held batterers accountability is that St. Louis County invested considerable resources into batterer accountability trainings, including the 2-day conference, Men Who Batter. Therefore, St. Louis County court workers may have become more aware over time of ways the dependency courts could increase their efforts to hold batterers accountable.

In addition, there were a wide variety of implementation activities across demonstration sites that were intended to increase batterer accountability in the court system, including safety audits to assess the criminal justice systems response to families experiencing domestic violence and child maltreatment, training events for court personnel on the impact of domestic violence on children and parenting, and the creation of tools outlining best practices for courts working with co-occurrence cases. The following are site-specific activities regarding batterer accountability and the court system:

El Paso County initiated a court pilot project for pre-sentence investigation and differential treatment of batterers to better evaluate the context and dynamics present in misdemeanor domestic violence cases and to provide as much information as possible to the county court judge prior to a sentencing hearing. El Paso County also hired a domestic violence case monitor to track compliance with batterer treatment enrollment and promote offender accountability. El Paso County stakeholders reported that the county court was particularly focused on batterer accountability and engaging men who were battered, but several stakeholders noted that despite or because of the focus on offenders, there were still gaps in victim safety efforts. The important differences, however, were that judges were now talking about these issues and the mechanisms are now in place for change.

In Grafton County, by request of the court system, the Department of Children, Youth and Families initiated the development of a comprehensive list of batterer intervention programs in the State and sought input from domestic violence crisis centers. This list was disseminated to courts throughout the State. Grafton County stakeholders reported that judges were now more likely to address and keep batterer accountability at the forefront of their work than before the Greenbook initiative. Some judges used community resources, such as batterer program providers in the State, to offer additional technical assistance and guidance.

In Lane County, the coordinator of Lane County Consortium Attorneys met with the Domestic Violence Council/Batterer Intervention Committee to discuss how to increase communication and understanding between attorneys representing families in dependency court and batterer intervention providers. Some Lane County stakeholders reported that they thought they should have started working on engaging batterers and batterer accountability earlier in the initiative. Other stakeholders felt too much energy was focused on domestic violence batterers and adult victims and not enough on the child victims of family violence.

In Santa Clara County, domestic violence victim advocates routinely met with judges to discuss ways to improve safety within courtrooms. As a result of these meetings, judges made changes to help ensure the safety of adult victims and make sure batterers are not intimidating victims. With six other counties, the sites Batterer Intervention Committee participated in an Administrative Office of the Courts study of the Santa Clara County court system, including court response and probation response to perpetrators of domestic violence. Additionally, the criminal court used a database to track batterers, and the court system compared probation statistics with batterer intervention statistics. This comparison showed that the number of individuals prosecuted for domestic violence tended to be higher than the number of individuals who enrolled in a batterer intervention program.

To increase batterer accountability in St. Louis County, a Criminal Court Violence Compliance Docket was implemented for persons convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence assaults. In late 2003, two of the St. Louis County Circuit Court judges who heard criminal cases began conducting compliance review hearings for batterers convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence assaults. To increase compliance, the judges worked with the local Association of Batterer Intervention Providers to develop a set of forms through which information about enrollment, attendance, and completion of batterer intervention programs was communicated. St. Louis County also began funding a batterer compliance coordinator to monitor compliance and facilitate communication between courts and batterer intervention programs in civil cases involving orders of protection that are issued in cases of intimate partner violence.

Although batterer accountability was not a primary focus of The Greenbook, demonstration sites undertook important activities to increase batterer accountability in the child welfare and court systems. This finding supports the fact that batterer accountability increasingly has become recognized as a pivotal issue to be addressed for ensuring the safety and well-being of adult and child victims of violence. Nevertheless, evidence from child welfare case files and implementation activities showed that additional improvement should be pursued.

The Greenbook national evaluation documented the progress of the six demonstration communities using a combination of process and outcome measures. The challenges encountered and successes marked by the sites offer a number of insights and lessons that can be valuable to other communities interested in following Greenbook recommendations. This section summarizes findings detailed in earlier chapters about collaboration, screening and assessment, safety and advocacy for child and adult victims, and batterer accountability.

Each of the demonstration sites developed collaboratives with representatives from each of the three primary systems (child welfare, domestic violence service providers, and the dependency court). Child welfare agency partners ranged from directors to managers and frontline workers. Domestic violence service providers were most often represented on the collaborations by their directors and advocates. The dependency courts were most often represented on the collaboration by judges, who were often seen as leaders on the initiative. Greenbook collaborative structures were established during the planning phase; however, each of the demonstration sites fine-tuned those structures during the early implementation phase. Four of the six sites established three-tiered governing structures during the planning phase; by the end of the implementation phase, all six sites were using an organizational structure that included an executive committee, advisory board, workgroups, and subcommittees.

Planning activities were critical to initiating Greenbook work, although Greenbook sites found that planning was a continuous process throughout the initiative. Needs assessments and logic models helped identify priorities and a framework for the work at the beginning of the initiative, but sites continued to review the logic models and implement other assessment activities, such as safety audits, well into the demonstration period. These later planning activities helped ground activities in overall project goals while providing new avenues for Greenbook work. The sites recognized the importance of including the community input, particularly from survivors of family violence and consumers of the primary systems, yet struggled to meaningfully and respectfully include that perspective. Activities designed to reinforce relationships among partners were conducted consistently throughout the initiative, and were even more important as sites launched their work and responded to challenges related to power and trust. Additionally, communicating the Greenbook message beyond the partners was not emphasized early, although these planning activities were critical to engaging the community, creating buy-in, and ensuring sustainability.

Systems change activities focused largely on training and informal policy or guidelines change, as well as changes to formal screening and assessment protocols. Stakeholders reported that true frontline collaborative efforts were most successful, however, as these activities put the collaborative framework into practice and directly affected the families served by primary partner agencies. Specialized positions in particular helped change institutionalized system practice while enhancing communication and institutional empathy across systems. Multidisciplinary review and response activities helped minimize blaming the non-offending parent and provided support and advocacy for all family members, while coordinating the efforts and services of multiple agencies. These planning and system change activities led to policy and practice changes in each of the primary systems and affected the families these systems served.

Significant resources and energy were devoted to changing domestic violence screening and assessment practices in child welfare agencies. In the Greenbook initiative communities, there was a shift in caseworker policy and practice, some of which was evident in child welfare case files.

Greenbook demonstration sites implemented a number of activities to create or improve screening and assessment protocols at intake and throughout the operations of child protection agencies. Some activities provided guidance for determining child placement in cases of domestic violence or offered services and support for children of families involved in domestic violence situations.

Evaluation data suggest that child welfare agencies at many sites made gains in having written guidelines concerning the reporting of domestic violence, which reflects the considerable resources and energy that were devoted to changing screening and assessment practices in child welfare agencies.

The Greenbook demonstration sites addressed a number of obstacles and implemented activities to respond to Greenbook recommendations for improving screening and assessment practices in child welfare and domestic violence service provider agencies. However, even with the resources and energy devoted to changing screening and assessment practices, sites needed time for training and should take steps to ensure full implementation before these activities can be sustained and institutionalized among direct service workers.

Respondents to the stakeholder and direct service worker surveys reported improvements in many of the child welfare and domestic violence safety and advocacy measures, with fewer improvements identified for dependency court safety and advocacy measures. They also reported improvements in training, collaboration between child welfare agencies and domestic violence service providers to address the issue of co-occurrence, and child welfare agencies having a written policy specifying when children could remain safely with the non-offending parent.

Given the high level of agreement with many of the measures early in the initiative, it appears that respondents felt they already had made some progress in these areas prior to the initiative. While sites reported implementing activities that addressed safety and advocacy for victims, the influence of these activities to change the perspectives of agency staff or stakeholders may take time.

Across demonstration sites, child welfare implementation activities focused on information sharing and specialized positions to address barriers to child welfare caseworkers working effectively with batterers. Direct service worker respondents tended to agree overall that they referred batterers to services and monitored compliance with court-ordered program requirements. The case file reviews at baseline, however, did not show as much evidence of this, but most sites showed increases in the proportion of co-occurrence cases that had documented referrals for batterers. Caseworkers were less likely to agree that information was recorded in a way that held perpetrators accountable. These findings indicated that caseworkers were beginning to receive the tools they needed to effectively engage perpetrators and promote family safety.

A wide variety of implementation activities was geared toward increasing batterer accountability within and outside the court system, including the following:

Although batterer accountability was not a primary focus of The Greenbook, demonstration sites made important strides to increase batterer accountability in the child welfare and court systems, supporting the fact that batterer accountability increasingly has become recognized as a pivotal issue that needs to be addressed to ensure the safety and well-being of adult and child victims of violence. However, even with the strides sites have made to increase batterer accountability, evidence from child welfare case files and implementation activities showed there is room for improvement.

The findings show themes that are evident across the different partner organizations, sites, and areas of implementation activities. These themes and evidence relating to them are presented below.

The sites undertook major collaborative efforts aimed at improving practices, services and outcomes for children and families

At its heart, Greenbook embodies a commitment to undertake collaborative efforts to change systems in order to improve practices, services and outcomes for children and families.

In the sites, major efforts were devoted to collaboration, and the collaborations developed and changed over time. Although important issues and conflicts continued to be experienced, sites reported that the success of their collaborations was one of the lasting accomplishments of the Greenbook initiative. Moreover, the models and protocols the Greenbook sites developed for collaboration in serving families provide a valuable resource that other communities and organizations can draw from to implement change in their settings[15].

The structure and work of the Greenbook collaborations changed over the demonstration period. Early in the initiative, the sites formed large collaborative bodies that undertook a variety of planning and collaborative development activities. Planning activities focused on analyses of needs and gaps, using such means as developing a logic model, incorporating the voice of domestic violence survivors and consumers of the primary systems, conducting safety audits, and doing system mapping to identify service gaps or duplication and needs for policies or information sharing to ensure families do not fall through the cracks.

During this period, also, the sites devoted efforts to developing the collaborative; they sought to ensure adequate representation of the different systems and worked on developing the collaborative structure and responsibilities. Although the collaboratives employed a variety of structures in the early period, all evolved to a structure that included an executive committee, a larger advisory board, and workgroups on specific issues. This provided mechanisms for developing and implementing plans around particular areas of concern (workgroups or subcommittees), obtaining input from diverse partners (advisory board), and making decisions for the collaborative (executive committee).

As the work of the Greenbook progressed, the collaboratives identified other needed partners, in addition to the three primary systems, and added them to the collaborative. Examples include other courts (e.g., criminal courts), batterer intervention programs, law enforcement, probation and parole, and substance abuse service providers. However, community and survivor input declined over time. This appears to have happened for several reasons, including the lack of a clear definition of community and problems of burnout for those who took on major roles in the collaboration. Sites did involve survivors in some ways. For instance, they were engaged as participants in focus groups to identify issues. Survivors also were included in collaborative structures as community representatives, and one site included family experts (e.g., previously battered mothers, former batterers) as family experts. Some sites noted that they should have devoted more efforts to communicating the Greenbook message beyond the collaborative partners and doing more to engage the community.

Although challenges to collaboration continued to be experience, collaboration was identifies as one of the successes of the Greenbook Initiative

The collaboratives faced a number of on-going challenges, reflecting the difficulty of the work they were engaged in together, philosophical differences among the partners, and differences in organizational structures, power, and authority.

Among the Greenbook partners, child welfare and the dependency courts represented major formal systems with well defined roles and considerable power. The domestic violence community, by contrast, is more typically made up of grassroots organizations that do not represent a single system.

Some issues were unresolved or had to be addressed repeatedly over time. Issues of power and trust, especially between domestic violence service providers and the other systems, were ongoing challenges. Sites employed a variety of strategies to address these issues, including use of facilitated retreats and other cross-system dialogue to raise and address issues, and structural changes to balance power (e.g., adding partners to the governing body and, in one site, the creation of a domestic violence consortium).

Another recurring issue involved domestic violence concerns about confidentiality. For example, practice changes to improve case-level collaboration (e.g., multi-disciplinary case reviews and hiring domestic violence advocates in the child welfare system) often included the child welfare agencys expectation that domestic violence service providers would share information about individual cases. This conflicted with the domestic violence philosophy of facilitating a safe environment for domestic violence victims by ensuring confidentiality. Sites implemented cross-trainings on confidentiality and related concerns to address this issue.

Despite these continuing challenges and unresolved issues, the collaborative efforts were seen by the partners as successful. By working collaboratively to implement the Greenbook guidelines and solve problems, the partner organizations had to address issues of power, trust, and responsibilities. The partners developed a degree of institutional empathy (that is, the understanding of the context and environment that shape how the other systems operate). They got to know each other better, to understand the challenges each faces, and to develop relationships at multiple levels within the organizations. They worked together to implement new ways to work together to serve families. The sites spent a great deal of time on collaboration, but see the relationships they developed, particularly the relationship between child welfare and domestic violence service providers as one of the successes of the Greenbook. Changes in the relationships were described as night and day and light years ahead of what they used to be.

Through the Greenbook initiative, there were changes in practice at the level of work with families and children. The different partner organizations contributed to this change in different ways

The Greenbook initiative asked communities and child- and family-serving organizations to take the guidelines presented in The Greenbook and put them into practice in the real, day-to-day world of agencies, organizations, families and communities. To bring about change, organizations needed to undertake major changes in activities, operations, and ways of thinking. The emerging literature on the implementation of evidence based practices provides a framework for undertaking and evaluating change. As this literature shows, successful implementation requires a number of factors, including assessment of need and readiness for change, support of key stakeholders, training and other support for changed practice, and ongoing feedback and adaptation (see for instance, Fixsen et al., 2005; Metz, 2007; Metz et al., 2007). The Greenbook demonstration initiative is one of a number of system change initiatives undertaken by the Department of Justice and other federal agencies. (For results of the evaluation of the Safe Start initiative for children exposed to violence, see the Winter 2008 issue of Best Practices in Mental Health.)

The different partners contributed in different ways to the collaborations. Judges took a lead role in the collaboration. They served as chairs or members of steering committees, lending their authority and influence within each community to help the collaborative do its work. domestic violence service providers were actively involved in the collaborative leadership and working groups. They served particularly as agents for change, ensuring the concerns of domestic violence victims were articulated and their needs addressed. Child welfare undertook substantial change in agency practice. Stakeholders noted that the participation of child welfare agency leaders and their willingness to forge relationships with organizations with which they historically have had troublesome relationships was a facilitator to the Greenbook process.

The demonstration sites experienced successes and challenges as well as reflections throughout the initiative that can guide other communities that are interested in launching systems change related to the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment. The following section highlights some of the key lessons learned by the demonstration communities.

Bringing about change requires time, effort and other resources. Furthermore, the process of change often is uneven and requires revisiting issues and needs repeatedly over time. Limited staff, funding and other resources are a challenge to collaborative efforts, especially if there are large differences among partners in the resources they bring.

The sites found several resources helpful for supporting change. Technical assistance from external consultants was a valuable resource for the Greenbook initiative. One of the key roles of technical assistance was to help break down barriers among partners and facilitate communication among them. In addition, the Greenbook sites provided valuable peer-to-peer support to each other.

Because child protection and domestic violence are addressed by different organizational entities, child welfare, domestic violence service providers and the courts had to work together to achieve Greenbook goals. Staff at all levels of the organizations worked together to carry out the Greenbook workin the governance board and working groups, in cross-trainings, and in work on individual cases (through the work of domestic violence advocates and multidisciplinary case reviews).

This multi-level collaboration forced the partner organizations and staff at all levels to address issues of trust, organizational philosophy, differential resources, and problem solving for families. Not all issues were resolved in all caseschallenges around power, trust, information sharing, and related issues continued to be faced. By working together, however, the partner organizations in the sites faced and made progress on these issues.

Achieving system change required work at multiple levels of the organizations and sustained work over time. Early in the initiative, the sites took time to do needs assessments, relationship building and other preliminary activities, and saw this effort as important to successful implementation of the initiative. Practice changes focused initially on improved identification of co-occurrence within the child welfare system and on training for workers.

Over time, the structure of the collaboratives and the collaborative membership changed. The structures evolved to ones involving a decision making body, a larger advisory group, and workgroups that focused on developing and implementing plans in specific areas. The sites added other partners, such as law enforcement or batterer intervention programs, as the initiatives needs and focus developed.

In other instances, changes were less positive. Over time, community and survivor input declined, and several sites noted that they should have devoted more efforts to communicating with and engaging the community. Similarly, lack of collaboration between dependency courts and other courts was identified as a gap in the work of the Greenbook.

Sites varied in the degree of involvement and the timing of involvement of workers. They noted that implementing new policies at the front line practice level was a challenge for several reasons: the gap between leadership and direct service workers; staff workload; and high staff turnover. Once policy or practice was changed on paper, they needed to provide training and support for implementation. Several noted that engaging front line workers earlier could have helped this process.

Although the Federal funding for the Greenbook initiative has ended, there has been continuing work in this area. Some of that work and other next steps are discussed briefly below.

Sites sought to continue the work they had begun under the initiative. They pursued grant opportunities and additional funding to sustain their work, including specialized positions and many of the protocols and trainings that were developed over the course of the initiative. Stakeholders noted that strong leadership in the agencies and in the community were critical to sustaining the work.

The sites used the technical assistance they received to develop sustainability plans, which included plans for seeking to embed the goals of the initiative in the partner agencies and in the community. Stakeholders noted that even if the activities funded through the Greenbook initiative did not continue, the relationships, communication mechanisms, training, and practices developed would continue to earn support.

Federal efforts have continued. Following the Greenbook demonstration initiative, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has continued its partnership with the U.S. Department of Justices Violence against Women Office to bring the lessons and ideas of Greenbook to other jurisdictions. Three states and three local communities were selected to receive technical assistance support that is designed to help them move forward in how they are addressing the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment. This support includes consultation with a team from the Family Violence Prevention Fund and the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges, access to Greenbook materials and products, a meeting between these new sites and project directors from the demonstration sites, and funding of expert consultants to assist sites. In addition, Federal funds continue to support the enhancement of the Greenbook web site which contains materials helpful to any jurisdiction doing this work.

In addition, the evaluation findings, as presented in the executive summary and the final report chapters, provide information on the kinds of efforts the Greenbook sites undertook, the ones that showed promise of success, and the challenges experienced in implementing and sustaining change. These results were also included in five articles scheduled for publication in a special issue of the Journal of Interpersonal Violence (Edleson & Malik, eds., forthcoming). These findings are useful to a variety of audiences, including funders interested in supporting similar system change efforts, technical assistance providers working with communities, evaluators, and others committed to the implementation of promising practices in child-and family-serving agencies and organizations.

Schechter, S., & Edleson, J. L. (1994, June). In the best interest of women and children: A call for collaboration between child welfare and domestic violence constituencies. Paper presented at the Domestic Violence and Child Welfare: Integrating Policy and Practice for Families Conference, Racine, WI.

Schechter, S., & Edleson, J. L. (1999). Effective intervention in woman battering & child maltreatment cases: Guidelines for policy and practice: Recommendations from the National Council of Juvenile & Family Court Judges Family Violence Department. Reno, NV: National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges.

Caliber, an ICF Consulting Company is conducting an evaluation of the multi-site demonstration of collaborations to address domestic violence and child maltreatment (the Greenbook Initiative). The Greenbook Initiative and the evaluation are funded by the U.S. Department of Justice and Department of Health and Human Services.

The purposes of the evaluation are to develop information about several major issues:

What factors and activities lead to effective community collaborations to address domestic violence and child maltreatment?

What is the impact of the Greenbook Initiative on how organizations and systems respond to families with domestic violence and child maltreatment?

What is the impact of the Greenbook Initiative on how organizations and systems respond to one another?

You have been selected to participate in this Time 2 survey because you regularly work with families who experience child maltreatment and/or domestic violence, and because your agency is an official partner of the Greenbook initiative. The Greenbook initiative in your community is implementing several activities that seek to improve the way agencies work with families who experience child maltreatment and domestic violence. The attached survey will assess the change over time to the extent to which current practices and policies in your agency or place of work have changed. The survey items ask general questions about the activities that you undertake during the course of your regular work. We will use the responses you give now to determine whether these policies and practices have changed over time as a result of the Greenbook initiative.

The survey should take about 20 minutes to complete. We understand your concern about the confidentiality of your responses, and so the survey includes a stamped envelope addressed to Caliber for returning the survey to the National Evaluation Team -- your supervisor and your agency will not see your responses. The survey does not ask for any identifying information, but does include a code number that only the National Evaluation Team will utilize. This code is used to track the surveys that have been returned and those that are still outstanding. No one in your community will have access to your individual responses from this survey. In addition, because the study is being conducted for the National Institute of Justice, the data are protected against any disclosure by statute. This Federal statute requires that, without exception, the confidentiality of identifiable information will be maintained.

Your participation in this survey is completely voluntary and you may skip any questions you do not wish to answer. Your community has invested a lot of time and resources in the Greenbook initiative, and your responses to this survey will significantly help in that effort. If you do not wish to participate in this survey, please simply return the blank survey to us in the envelope provided.

If you have any questions, please contact Nicole Dutch at 703-385-3200 (from the National Evaluation Team).

Thank you for your cooperation; your input will provide valuable information to this evaluation.

1. How long have you been a worker at this court? Please enter the number of months or years.

MONTHS OR

YEARS

2. Overall, how long have you worked in the court system? Please enter the number of months or years.

MONTHS OR

YEARS

3. Are you male or female?

Male

Female

4. What is your race? Please check all that apply.

American Indian or Alaskan Native

Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander

Asian

White

Black or African American

Other

5. Are you of Hispanic or Latino origin?

Yes No

6. Do you regularly use a language other than English to work with families at your agency?

Yes No

If yes, please specify the primary language(s) used by you and the families to communicate:

7. Thinking about the families you worked with over the past 12 months, about what percent did you have reason to believe that there was domestic violence in addition to child maltreatment?

%

8. In the past 12 months, how many hours of training have you received in the following areas?

TOTAL HOURS

TOTAL HOURS

A. Domestic violence

E. Co-occurrence of domestic

B. Child Maltreatment

violence and child maltreatment

C. Cultural competency

F. Impact of domestic violence

D. Reasonable efforts

on children

The next set of questions asks about some general policies and practices at your agency. Please think about your agencys current policies and practices.

9. Please indicate the degree to which you agree or disagree with these statements:

In the following statements, dependency court refers to the court in your community that handles cases involving abuse/neglect, foster care, and protective services.

Thank you for completing the survey.

Please return it to Caliber in the envelope provided.

Greenbook National Evaluation

Direct Service Worker Survey - Informed Consent

Caliber, an ICF Consulting Company is conducting an evaluation of the multi-site demonstration of collaborations to address domestic violence and child maltreatment (the Greenbook Initiative). The Greenbook Initiative and the evaluation are funded by the U.S. Department of Justice and Department of Health and Human Services.

The purposes of the evaluation are to develop information about several major issues:

What factors and activities lead to effective community collaborations to address domestic violence and child maltreatment?

What is the impact of the Greenbook Initiative on how organizations and systems respond to families with domestic violence and child maltreatment?

What is the impact of the Greenbook Initiative on how organizations and systems respond to one another?

You have been selected to participate in this Time 2 survey because you regularly work with families who experience child maltreatment and/or domestic violence, and because your agency is an official partner of the Greenbook initiative. The Greenbook initiative in your community is implementing several activities that seek to improve the way agencies work with families who experience child maltreatment and domestic violence. The attached survey will assess the change over time to the extent to which current practices and policies in your agency or place of work have changed. The survey items ask general questions about the activities that you undertake during the course of your regular work. We will use the responses you give now to determine whether these policies and practices have changed over time as a result of the Greenbook initiative.

The survey should take about 20 minutes to complete. We understand your concern about the confidentiality of your responses, and so the survey includes a stamped envelope addressed to Caliber for returning the survey to the National Evaluation Team -- your supervisor and your agency will not see your responses. The survey does not ask for any identifying information, but does include a code number that only the National Evaluation Team will utilize. This code is used to track the surveys that have been returned and those that are still outstanding. No one in your community will have access to your individual responses from this survey. In addition, because the study is being conducted for the National Institute of Justice, the data are protected against any disclosure by statute. This Federal statute requires that, without exception, the confidentiality of identifiable information will be maintained.

Your participation in this survey is completely voluntary and you may skip any questions you do not wish to answer. Your community has invested a lot of time and resources in the Greenbook initiative, and your responses to this survey will significantly help in that effort. If you do not wish to participate in this survey, please simply return the blank survey to us in the envelope provided.

If you have any questions, please contact Nicole Dutch at 703-385-3200 (from the National Evaluation Team).

Thank you for your cooperation; your input will provide valuable information to this evaluation.

1. How long have you been a child welfare worker at this agency? Please enter the number of months or years.

MONTHS OR

YEARS

2. Overall, how long have you worked in the child welfare system? Please enter the number of months or years.

MONTHS OR

YEARS

3. Are you male or female?

Male

Female

4. What is your race? Please check all that apply.

American Indian or Alaskan Native

Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander

Asian

White

Black or African American

Other

5. Are you of Hispanic or Latino origin?

Yes No

6. Do you regularly use a language other than English to work with families at your agency?

Yes No

If yes, please specify the primary language(s) used by you and the families to communicate:

7. Thinking about the families you worked with over the past 12 months, about what percent did you have reason to believe that there was domestic violence in addition to child maltreatment?

%

8. In the past 12 months, how many hours of training have you received in the following areas?

TOTAL HOURS

TOTAL HOURS

A. Domestic violence

E. Co-occurrence of domestic

B. Child Maltreatment

violence and child maltreatment

C. Cultural competency

F. Impact of domestic violence

D. Reasonable efforts

on children

The next set of questions asks about some general policies and practices at your agency. Please think about your agencys current policies and practices.

9. Please indicate the degree to which you agree or disagree with the following statements about your agency's policies and practices.

10. Please indicate the extent to which you agree that service planning at your agency focuses on the following areas.

Thank you for completing the survey.

Please return it to Caliber in the envelope provided.

Greenbook National Evaluation

Direct Service Worker Survey - Informed Consent

Caliber, an ICF Consulting Company is conducting an evaluation of the multi-site demonstration of collaborations to address domestic violence and child maltreatment (the Greenbook Initiative). The Greenbook Initiative and the evaluation are funded by the U.S. Department of Justice and Department of Health and Human Services.

The purposes of the evaluation are to develop information about several major issues:

What factors and activities lead to effective community collaborations to address domestic violence and child maltreatment?

What is the impact of the Greenbook Initiative on how organizations and systems respond to families with domestic violence and child maltreatment?

What is the impact of the Greenbook Initiative on how organizations and systems respond to one another?

You have been selected to participate in this Time 2 survey because you regularly work with families who experience child maltreatment and/or domestic violence, and because your agency is an official partner of the Greenbook initiative. The Greenbook initiative in your community is implementing several activities that seek to improve the way agencies work with families who experience child maltreatment and domestic violence. The attached survey will assess the change over time to the extent to which current practices and policies in your agency or place of work have changed. The survey items ask general questions about the activities that you undertake during the course of your regular work. We will use the responses you give now to determine whether these policies and practices have changed over time as a result of the Greenbook initiative.

The survey should take about 20 minutes to complete. We understand your concern about the confidentiality of your responses, and so the survey includes a stamped envelope addressed to Caliber for returning the survey to the National Evaluation Team -- your supervisor and your agency will not see your responses. The survey does not ask for any identifying information, but does include a code number that only the National Evaluation Team will utilize. This code is used to track the surveys that have been returned and those that are still outstanding. No one in your community will have access to your individual responses from this survey. In addition, because the study is being conducted for the National Institute of Justice, the data are protected against any disclosure by statute. This Federal statute requires that, without exception, the confidentiality of identifiable information will be maintained.

Your participation in this survey is completely voluntary and you may skip any questions you do not wish to answer. Your community has invested a lot of time and resources in the Greenbook initiative, and your responses to this survey will significantly help in that effort. If you do not wish to participate in this survey, please simply return the blank survey to us in the envelope provided.

If you have any questions, please contact Nicole Dutch at 703-385-3200 (from the National Evaluation Team).

Thank you for your cooperation; your input will provide valuable information to this evaluation.

Direct Service Worker Survey

Domestic Violence Service Providers

Please check this box to indicate that you have received, read and understand the informed consent information on the preceding page.

1. How long have you worked in domestic violence services at this organization? Please enter the number of months or years.

MONTHS OR

YEARS

2. Overall, how long have you worked in the area of domestic violence services? Please enter the number of months or years.

MONTHS OR

YEARS

3. Are you male or female?

Male

Female

4. What is your race? Please check all that apply.

American Indian or Alaskan Native

Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander

Asian

White

Black or African American

Other

5. Are you of Hispanic or Latino origin?

Yes No

6. Do you regularly use a language other than English to work with families at your agency?

Yes No

If yes, please specify the primary language(s) used by you and the families to communicate:

7. Thinking about the families you worked with over the past 12 months, about what percent did you have reason to believe that there was child maltreatment in addition to domestic violence?

%

8. In the past 12 months, how many hours of training have you received in the following areas?

TOTAL HOURS

TOTAL HOURS

A. Domestic violence

E. Co-occurrence of domestic

B. Child Maltreatment

violence and child maltreatment

C. Cultural competency

F. Impact of domestic violence

D. Reasonable efforts

on children

The next set of questions asks about some general policies and practices at your agency. Please think about your agencys current policies and practices.

9. Please indicate the degree to which you agree or disagree with the following statements about your agency's policies and practices:

Thank you for completing the survey.

Please return it to Caliber in the envelope provided.

Stakeholder Survey

This survey is designed to help us learn more about the continued planning and implementation process, the resources available to the community, and the level of collaboration among systems in your community. This will be the second round of data collection efforts therefore we are continuing to look at the status of the local initiative and the changes in the level of collaboration among systems. The project director in your community recommended you for this survey because you are active in the Greenbook planning process.

The survey should take about 20 minutes to complete. We understand your concern about the confidentiality of your responses, and so the survey includes a stamped envelope addressed to Caliber Associates for returning the survey to the National Evaluation Teamno one in your community will see your responses. The survey does not ask for any identifying information, but does include a code number so that we can track which surveys have been returned and which are still outstanding. Only the National Evaluation Team will utilize this code number. No one in your community will have access to your individual responses from this survey.

Your participation in this survey is completely voluntary. Your community has invested a lot of time and resources in the Greenbook Initiative, and your responses to this survey will significantly help in that effort. If you do not wish to participate in this survey, please simply return the blank survey to us in the attached envelope, and we will not contact you any further.

COUNTY: ___________________________ DATE: _________________________

BACKGROUND

1. When did you first begin to actively participate in the Greenbook Initiative?

____(Mo.)/____(Yr.)

2. What type of organization do you represent? Check one response category that most closely fits your organization.

Courts (If you work in the court system, what kind of cases do you primarily deal with)

5. The following statements refer to your collaborative beginning in July 2002, of the Greenbook Initiative process. For each statement below, please indicate the extent to which you agree with each statement, using the following scale: 1 means you strongly disagree with the statement and 5 means you strongly agree with the statement.

Strongly Disagree

Disagree

Neither Agree nor Disagree

Agree

Strongly Agree

A. There was widespread support for the Greenbook Initiative among leadership of the various participating organizations.

1

2

3

4

5

B. Senior managers of the various participating organizations were actively involved in issues regarding the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment.

1

2

3

4

5

C. Leaders of the various participating organizations were willing to commit resources and/or staff time for the Greenbook Initiative effort.

1

2

3

4

5

D. Senior managers and directors of key organizations saw the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment as a problem in your community.

1

2

3

4

5

E. Stakeholders recognized the importance of issues involving the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment.

1

2

3

4

5

F. Local data on the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment were available in your community.

1

2

3

4

5

G. There was a high level of expertise and training on the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment among those working on the Greenbook Initiative.

1

2

3

4

5

H. Local laws were conducive to developing interagency collaborative relationships.

1

2

3

4

5

I. State laws were conducive to developing interagency collaborative relationships.

1

2

3

4

5

J. Programs in your community were conducive to developing interagency collaborative relationships.

1

2

3

4

5

K. There was a history of productive interaction among courts, domestic violence providers, and child protective agencies

M. Addressing the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment was a strong priority in your community.

1

2

3

4

5

6. Please rate the extent to which each of the following served as obstacles to your local Greenbook Initiative since July 2002. Please use the following scale where 1 means not at all an obstacle and 5 means very much an obstacle.

R. Other (specify and rate): __________________________________________

1

2

3

4

5

S. Other (specify and rate): __________________________________________

1

2

3

4

5

T. Other (specify and rate): __________________________________________

1

2

3

4

5

7. Please rate the extent to which each of the following factors has contributed to the success of the Greenbook Initiative in your community since July 2002. Please using the scale below where 1 means not at all a success factor and 5 means very much a success factor.

Not at all

A little

Somewhat

Moderately

Very much

A. Collaborative member agreement about the nature of the problem

1

2

3

4

5

B. Input from frontline workers

1

2

3

4

5

C. The partners in the project work well together

1

2

3

4

5

D. Having the right people at the table

1

2

3

4

5

E. Strong leadership

1

2

3

4

5

F. Well-defined roles among collaborative members

1

2

3

4

5

G. Well-specified activities

1

2

3

4

5

H. Accountability for meetings, tasks and activities

1

2

3

4

5

I. Agencies and organizations having necessary resources

1

2

3

4

5

J. Law enforcement involvement

1

2

3

4

5

K. Commitment of key leaders

1

2

3

4

5

L. Commitment/time availability of participants

1

2

3

4

5

M. Involvement of certain key agencies/groups

1

2

3

4

5

N. Individual relationships among collaborative members and agency staff

1

2

3

4

5

O. Having infrastructure in place to support the initiative

1

2

3

4

5

P. The partners have the needs of the women and children in mind

1

2

3

4

5

Q. Other (specify and rate): _______________________________________

1

2

3

4

5

R. Other (specify and rate): _______________________________________

1

2

3

4

5

S. Other (specify and rate): ________________________________________

1

2

3

4

5

8. The following statements refer to the Greenbook planning process in your community. Please indicate the extent to which you agree with each statement.

Strongly Disagree

Disagree

Neither Agree nor Disagree

Agree

Strongly Agree

A. The Greenbook planning process has feeling of cohesiveness and team spirit.

J. There is a formal process for resolving conflicts among participating organizations.

1

2

3

4

5

K. There is a shared vision of what the group should accomplish.

1

2

3

4

5

L. There are clearly defined, attainable goals for the initiative.

1

2

3

4

5

M. Each member has an equal voice in the partnership

1

2

3

4

5

N. The planning process is flexible enough to accept diversity in members views and backgrounds.

1

2

3

4

5

O. The partnership includes members representative of the cultural/ethnic diversity of the community.

1

2

3

4

5

P. The collaborative has a strong commitment from the policy-making level of each organization that is represented.

1

2

3

4

5

Q. Representation from key players within the initiative is adequate.

1

2

3

4

5

R. Number of stakeholders involved in the initiative is adequate.

1

2

3

4

5

S. Stakeholders working on the initiative have many competing responsibilities.

1

2

3

4

5

Thank you for completing this survey thus far. The next three sets of questions pertain to courts, domestic violence service providers, and child protection services in your community. If you are unable to answer questions pertaining to them, please skip to the end of the survey.

9. The following statements refer to the courts and judges who deal with domestic violence and child maltreatment cases in your community. In the following statements, dependency court refers to the court in your community that handles cases involving abuse/neglect, foster care, and protective services. Please indicate the extent to which you agree with each of the following statements.

Strongly Disagree

Disagree

Neither Agree nor Disagree

Agree

Strongly Agree

A. Judges in the dependency court are knowledgeable about the effects of domestic violence on adult victims

1

2

3

4

5

B. Judges in the dependency court are knowledgeable about the effects of domestic violence on children

1

2

3

4

5

C. Judges in the dependency court are knowledgeable about the dynamics of the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment

1

2

3

4

5

D. Judges in the dependency court participate in education/ training on the effects of domestic violence on children

1

2

3

4

5

E. Judges in the dependency court participate in education/training on the dynamics of the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment

1

2

3

4

5

F. Judges in the dependency court interact with domestic violence service providers for the purposes of exchanging information and communication.

1

2

3

4

5

G. Judges in the dependency court interact with child welfare agencies for the purposes of exchanging information and communication.

For the purposes of the National Evaluation, co-occurrence is defined as:

A case with actual or peripheral evidence that a child is maltreated by a household member* according to the Federal 1996 Child Abuse, Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA) which occurs concurrent with or related to the childs parent or primary caregiver experiencing intimate partner violence.

*A household member is someone who is a regular fixture in the home of the child and the primary caregiver, such as a household resident, a current partner of the primary caregiver, or a former spouse who maintains contact with the child. The household member is defined by an emotional relationship with the child or primary caregiver, not a business relationship (e.g., childcare provider).

And substantiation is defined as:

"The child welfare agency has determined that maltreatment has occurred, has verified the maltreatment, and the maltreatment meets the threshold consistent with the state statute."

· The sample will be randomly drawn from all cases where the child welfare agency substantiated child maltreatment.

o Time 1: Cases where child maltreatment was substantiated in 2001

o Time 2: Cases where child maltreatment was substantiated in 2003

· Each site will randomly sample 25% of these cases, stratified by whether the case was substantiated child maltreatment in the first six months of the calendar year or the second six months of the calendar year.

o The minimum sample size for each data collection point is 75, so sites whose 25% sample results in an N less than 75 will randomly sample 75 cases, rather than 25% (or abstract data from all cases opened in the calendar year if desired).

o The maximum sample size is 150, so sites whose 25% sample results in an N greater than 150 will randomly sample 150 cases, rather than 25%.

[Appendix B begins on page 113 of the PDF Version, use that version for the exact layout of these forms.]

1 Stakeholders were asked to rate the extent to which each statement served as an obstacle to their local Greenbook initiative using following scale: 1=not at all; 2=a little; 3=somewhat; 4=moderately; 5=very much.

* p< 0.05. The Kruskal-Wallis Test, a one-way analysis of variance by ranks, was used to examine whether there were significant changes over time associated with mean scores for the stakeholder survey data.

4 Bold values in this table indicate significant change over time where p < 0.05 using the Kruskal-Wallis Test.

5 NA indicates that this measure was not included in a survey.

Services and Advocacy: Dependency Court Measures1

Direct Service Worker Survey2

Stakeholder Survey3

Baseline Mean

Follow-up Mean

Baseline Mean

Follow-up Mean

4.3.1 Staff training and knowledge about co-occurrence

Judges in the dependency court participate in education/training on the effects of domestic violence on children

2.86

3.13

6.33

6.88

Judges in the dependency court participate in education/training on the dynamics of the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment

2.86

3.06

5.93

7.194

Judges in the dependency court are knowledgeable about the effects of domestic violence on adult victims

3.27

3.13

6.81

7.16

Judges in the dependency court are knowledgeable about the effects of domestic violence on children

3.46

3.38

6.71

7.29

Judges in the dependency court are knowledgeable about the dynamics of the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment

3.33

3.22

6.18

6.61

The dependency court recognizes the unique dynamics of co-occurrence cases

2.97

3.03

NA5

NA5

4.3.2 Case information sharing

Judges in the dependency court interact with domestic violence service providers for the purposes of exchanging information and communication

3.00

2.88

5.07

5.38

Judges in the dependency court interact with child welfare agencies for the purposes of exchanging information and communication

3.22

3.31

7.92

7.41

When courts and agencies exchange information concerning family members, the safety and privacy concerns of all parties are balanced carefully with the need for access to such potentially harmful information

3.11

3.13

NA5

NA5

4.3.3 Case collaboration

The dependency court collaborates with other courts when there is more than one case involving the same family members or parties

2.89

2.77

NA5

NA5

4.3.4 Services and support

The dependency court requires child welfare to ensure that separate service plans were created for the perpetrator and victims of domestic violence

3.15

3.26

NA5

NA5

The dependency court holds a child welfare agency accountable for making reasonable efforts to avoid removal of children from their homes

3.03

3.19

NA5

NA5

The dependency court holds a child welfare agency accountable for making reasonable efforts to achieve reunification

[1] For more information on the Greenbook initiative, including sample protocols and tools, visit the Greenbook initiative website: http://www.thegreenbook.info/.

[2] San Francisco County is not represented in the follow-up findings of this report. It participated in all baseline data collection and is included in The Greenbook Demonstration Initiative: Process Evaluation Report: Phase 1 and The Greenbook Demonstration Initiative: Interim Evaluation Report. During data collection for the final reporting period, San Francisco County underwent a leadership and funding reorganization. It participated in site visits but was unable to participate in other evaluation activities. San Francisco County has now resumed many of the data collection activities.

[3] Additional information about the six demonstration sites is available in The Greenbook Demonstration Initiative Process Evaluation Report: Phase I (Caliber Associates, Education Development Center, Inc., & The National Center for State Courts, 2004b).

[4] The Journal of Interpersonal Violence plans to publish a special issue to present the Greenbook initiative national evaluation findings to a wide research- and policy-oriented audience. Three articles in the special issue will examine policy and practice changes within the three primary systems. One article will document Greenbook collaborative processes; and another will offer reflections from individuals who developed the framework for The Greenbook and the demonstration initiative. Many national evaluation findings covered in this report will be included in the special issue.

[5] The lower number of respondents is likely due to the fact that one of the demonstration sites did not participate in the follow-up data collection period.

[6] The lower number of respondents is likely due to the fact that one of the demonstration sites did not participate in the follow-up data collection period.

[10] Grafton County court workers did not participate in the follow-up direct service worker survey; therefore, baseline Grafton County data submitted by court workers were not included in this report.

[11] For the measure about courts sharing information with child welfare agencies, the stakeholder mean score was 7.41 at follow-up, or neither agree nor disagree, and direct service worker mean score was 3.31 at follow-up, or agree. For the measure about courts sharing information with domestic violence service providers, the stakeholder mean score was 5.38 at follow-up, or disagree, and the direct service worker mean score was 2.88, or disagree.

[12] Another urban site hired a domestic violence victim advocate in December 2006; however, this position was filled after follow-up direct service worker survey data had been collected. This position was co-located at the Family Court in the child protective service and was supervised by both a legal advocate and the head of the court child protection department.

[14] Grafton County court workers did not participate with the follow-up direct service worker survey; therefore, baseline Grafton County findings submitted by court workers are not included in this report.

[15] For more information on the Greenbook Initiative, including sample protocols and tools, please visit the Greenbook Initiative website: http://www.thegreenbook.info/.

Survey Disclaimer

According to the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, no persons are required to respond to a collection of information unless it displays a valid OMB control number. The valid OMB control number for this information collection is 0990-0379. The time required to complete this information collection is estimated to average 5 minutes per response, including the time to review instructions, search existing data resources, gather the data needed, and complete and review the information collection. If you have comments concerning the accuracy of the time estimate(s) or suggestions for improving this form, please write to: U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, OS/OCIO/PRA, 200 Independence Ave., S.W., Suite 336-E, Washington D.C. 20201, Attention: PRA Reports Clearance Officer.